High power fiber laser cutter technology is the mainstream development of future laser cutting, which is generally recognized by this industry. No matter from the perspective of market competition or the direction of user application, the growth rate of high power fiber laser cutter technology is getting stronger every year. Before 2016, the high power fiber laser cutter market was dominated by 2KW-6KW. Today, 12KW, 15KW, 20KW and 30KW have become the main strength of the laser cutting market, and even 40KW laser cutters have been launched. Why are high power laser cutting machines so popular? Compared with medium and low power laser cutting technology, what are the advantages of high power fiber laser cutter technology?

Advantage 1: The cutting thickness is greatly increased

At present, the thickness of high power fiber laser cutter can cut aluminum alloy plates is up to 40mm, and the thickness of stainless steel plates can reach 130mm. With the continuous upgrading of high-power laser cutting machine technology, the thickness of cutting materials will continue to rise, and the price of processing thick plates will gradually go down, which can  accelerate the application of fiber laser cutter in the field of thick plates.

The cutting limit thickness of 15kw fiber laser reaches 75mm or more, and the cutting quality is good. Compared with lower power lasers, the improvement of cutting ability has qualitatively improved, so that the processing range of the laser cutting machine has been significantly improved.

Advantage 2: The efficiency of cutting medium and thin plates is doubled

When choosing the power of laser cutting equipment, the cutting speed of different materials is the key factor to be investigated. Fiber laser cutting has obvious advantages in the processing of medium and low-thickness sheets. The increase in laser power can increase the cutting speed twice, and the increase in speed brings an exponential increase in the economic benefits of fiber laser cutting machines.

Take the common 20KW and 12KW in the market as an example, compare with 6KW cutting speed:

It is obvious that the cutting efficiency of 20KW and 12KW of carbon steel and stainless steel of common thickness is significantly better than 6KW, and the cutting speed is increased by 50-320%. The thinner the material, the less obvious advantage due to excess power. The thicker the material, the more obvious the advantage.

Advantage 3: Increased diversity of cutting processes

In addition to the advantage of cutting thicker and faster, with the increase of laser power, the laser cutting process can also show more cutting techniques, such as the highly acclaimed high-speed bright surface cutting technology. that is, under the condition of sufficient power, use small nozzles, low air pressure, and high-power laser to cut carbon steel plates of different thicknesses at high speed, obtaining a smooth cutting section and a smaller processing taper. The smooth cut surface facilitates the subsequent processing of customers, at the same time, the taper can be basically controlled below 0.2mm on both sides, which can better meet customer requirements in certain high-precision processing industries.

Three cutting conditions must be met to achieve fast and bright surface cutting for carbon steel:

·①　Small nozzle: double-layer nozzle, between 1.0-2.0mm;

②　High power: The higher the power, the greater the limit thickness of the carbon steel bright surface that can be cut, and the efficiency will be significantly improved;

③　Air pressure: mostly between 0.6-1.2Bar.

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In actual operation, not only do you need to meet these conditions, but also you’ll need professional debugging to achieve stable and consistent results.

As a very ideal processing method in cutting processing, laser cutting represents the development trend of modern metal processing technology. High-power laser cutting machines are also currently undergoing key technology research and development in high speed, high precision, large format three-dimensional cutting and special material cutting, so as to promote the high power laser cutting technology to meet the growing market demand.