Bs. Yilbas et al., CLOSED-FORM AND NUMERICAL-SOLUTIONS TO THE LASER-HEATING PROCESS, Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Part C, Journal of mechanical engineering science, 212(2), 1998, pp. 141-151
The laser processing of engineering materials requires an in-depth ana
lysis of the applicable heating mechanism. The modelling of the laser
heating process offers improved understanding of the machining mechani
sm. In the present study, a closed-form solution for a step input lase
r heating pulse is obtained and a numerical scheme solving a three-dim
ensional heat transfer equation is introduced. The numerical solution
provides a comparison of temperature profiles with those obtained from
the analytical approach. To validate the analytical and numerical sol
utions, an experiment is conducted to measure the surface temperature
and evaporating front velocity during the Nd-YAG laser heating process
. It is found that the temperature profiles resulting from both theory
and experiment are in a good agreement. However, a small discrepancy
in temperatures at the upper end of the profiles occurs. This may be d
ue to the assumptions made in both the numerical and the analytical ap
proaches. In addition, the equilibrium time, based on the energy balan
ce among the internal energy gain, conduction losses and latent heat o
f fusion, is introduced.