Nd-YAG LASER MICRO WELDING OF STAINLESS WIRE

Applicability of laser micro welding process to the fabrication of medical devices was investigated. Austenitic stainless steel wire (SUS304) was spot melted and crosswise welded, which is one of the most possible welding process for the fabrication of medical devices, by using a Nd-YAG laser. Effects of welding parameters on the microstructure, tensile strength and corrosion resistance were discussed. In the spot melting, melted metal width decreased with decreasing the input energy and pulse duration. Controlling the laser wave to reduce laser noise which occurred in the early stage of laser irradiation made reasonable welding condition wider in the welding condition of small pulse duration such as 2ms. The microstructure of the melted metal was a cellular dendrite structure and the cell size of the weld metal was about 0.5~3.5 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$. Tensile strength increased with the decrease of the melted metal width and reached to a maximum about 660MPa, which is comparable with that for the tempered base metal. Even by immersion test at 318K for 3600ks in quasi biological environment (0.9% NaCl), microstructure of the melted metal and tensile strength hardly changed from those for as melted material. In the crosswise welding, joints morphologies were classified into 3 types by the melting state of lower wire. Fracture load increased with input energy and melted area of lower wire, and reached to a maximum about 80N. However, when input energy was further increased and lower wire was fully melted, fracture load decreased due to the burn out of weld metal.