TY - JOUR A1 - Schneider, André A1 - Gumenyuk, Andrey A1 - Rethmeier, Michael T1 - Mobile vacuum in pocket format, mobile local low-pressure cap for high power laser beam welding of thick materials T2 - Laser-Technik-Journal : LTJ N2 - The presented apparatus enables laser beam welding of thick materials under local reduced pressure conditions, thus improving the quality of welds and reducing the laser beam power necessary for complete penetration welding. The vacuum cap presented in this article uses a local reduced ambient pressure environment in a tight zone around the welding area and, in contrast to a conventional vacuum chamber, it is movable in the welding direction. The mobile installation is very compact and reaches pressure values of around 200 mbar. The reduced pressure in the vacuum cap is sufficient to generate 50 % higher penetration depth in comparison to welding under ambient pressure conditions. The low pressure around the keyhole reduces the vapour-plasma plume and therefore prevents a defocusing and scattering of the laser radiation. This allows to raise the amount of laser beam power entering the keyhole as well as the effective power density. PB - Wiley-VCH CY - Weinheim KW - High power laser beam welding KW - Mobile vacuum KW - Local reduced pressure KW - Vapor plume KW - Keyhole PY - 2015 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-bam/frontdoor/index/index/docId/34583 AN - OPUS4-34583 SN - 1613-7728 SN - 1863-9119 VL - 12 IS - 4 SP - 43 EP - 44 AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany