Shinsuke Sakai

Develoment of 2D simulation model for laser welding

Laser welding includes many complicated phenomena such as absorption of laser light on material surface, phase transition from solid to liquid and from liquid to gas, laser light absorption and refraction within plasma, and so on. Two- dimensional unified simulation model was developed for laser welding of thick plate, and verification test using 4kW-YAG laser was carried out. Thermal-hydraulic phenomena of welding pool and keyhole are solved numerically using CIP (Cubic- Interpolated Propagation) and C-CUP (CIP-Combined Unified Procedure) method based on conservative equations of the multi-phase and multi-component fluids. Multiple reflection of laser light on the keyhole surface, absorption and refraction of laser light within the plasma are treated by ray tracing method. The availability of the model was confirmed to compare the results of experiments with numerical analysis.