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2.0 μm fiber lasers provide a high beam quality and a high‐power output, which makes them ideal for welding and cutting a wide variety of commercially used plastics, as well as marking plastics, metals or even food. At 2.0 μm wavelength the intrinsic absorption of most thermoplastics is high enough to weld or cut without applying any absorbent additives or coatings. Compared to commonly used near‐infrared systems, welding with 2.0 μm lasers can improve heat distribution and gap bridging and enable transmission welding for challenging materials.
Fiber lasers are increasingly replacing the commonly used diode lasers in laser transmission welding of plastics for challenging applications due to their superior beam quality and the ability to use long working distances and small spot sizes. At the same time, these smaller spot sizes increase the risk of thermal degradation. In this work, we investigate different scanning strategies that allow controlling the weld seam widths. These strategies are characterized regarding the demands on the performance of the scanner system, the risk of thermal degradation and the mechanical properties of the resulting welds.