PULSED-LASER HEATING OF STEEL SURFACES - FOURIER AND ELECTRON KINETIC-THEORY APPROACHES

Application of Fourier theory to heat conduction due to high power las er irradiation may give closed form solution to the problem. On the ot her hand: the heat flux through a given plane depends on the electron energy distribution through the material and at the scale of distance required to examine the problem, the material can no longer be conside red as being homogeneous continuum, therefore, errors may occur when c onsidering the Fourier theory in laser heating process. The problem re quires to be examined in the quantum field. The present study examines the pulse laser heating process when considering both Fourier conduct ion and electron-kinetic theory approaches. Analytical solution to Fou rier heat conduction equation are obtained for the intensity step inpu t pulse while numerical scheme is introduced to solve the heat transfe r equation resulted from kinetic theory approach. It is found that bot h Fourier and electron kinetic theory approaches result in similar tem perature profiles for a step input intensity pulse. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd.