. ....x.:.s::::5::::~:i:i:i:i.~ ~-J~!~i~i~ii:.~:i:::.'::;:.:-:-...- .....

applied
surface science
ELSEVIER Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175

Heat transfer analysis o f laser heated surfaces - conduction

limited case
B.S. Yilbas *, S.Z. Shuja
Mechanical Engineering Department, KFUPM, P.O. Box 1913, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia
Received 12 February 1996; accepted4 June 1996

Abstract

The laser surface heat treatment technique is widely spread in industry for the treatment of the engineering parts. To
improve the heat treatment process, study of the heat transfer mechanism appropriate to the laser heating is necessary. The
present study develops an analytical solution to the laser heating process using the Fourier heat conduction model. The
temperature distribution inside the substance together with its variations in the direction perpendicular to surface are
predicted. The validity of the Fourier theory in laser heating is also discussed. To validate the theoretical predictions, the
measurement of surface temperature is carried out. The study is extended to include the effect of the laser output pulse
lengths.

1. Introduction impurities and defect structures. The mean free colli-

Lasers are widely used as a machine tool to
modify the surface of the engineering materials. This
is due to the attainment of the high heating and
cooling rates through a rapid precision heating pro-
cess. However, the laser heating process is governed
by the absorption mechanism. The absorption of the
laser energy takes place through photon interaction
with bound and free electrons in the material struc-
ture, whereby these electrons are raised to higher
energy levels [1]. The further conversion of this
energy takes place through various collision pro-
cesses involving electrons, lattice phonons, ionized
* Corresponding author.
sion time in this energy transfer process is of the
order of 10 -12 to 10 -14 s [2]. During the time in
which laser machining pulses ( = 10 -6 s) and Q-
switched pulses (-~ 10 -9 s) take place, the absorbing
electrons have sufficient time to undergo many colli-
sions. This leads to the first assumption to be consid-
ered, i.e. the laser energy is instantaneously con-
verted to heat at the point at which absorption took
place. The further assumptions of local equilibrium
and the validity of the concept of local temperature
follow, thereby allowing a conventional heat transfer
analysis to be made. It has b e e n shown previously
that the room temperature absorptivity of metals, i.e.
the fraction of the incident beam energy absorbed,
appears to be low and the effective absorptivity
under intense radiation appears to increase substan-
tially [3]. The formation of oxidation on the surface
reduces the reflectivity considerably [3].

0169-4332/97/$17.00 Copyright 1997 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII S0169-4332(96)00570-3
168 B.S. Yilbas, .&Z Shuja /Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175
Two regimes are of interest in laser machining of
materials which correspond to low and high intensity
irradiation. The terms low and high are relative and
apply when the machining processes are conduction
limited and non-conducting limited respectively, i.e.
material removal rates due to evaporation are consid-
ered in the non-conduction limited case. In general,
laser heat treatment of material surfaces is a conduc-
tion limited process.
On the other hand, the heat transfer mechanism
governing the laser processing is extremely impor-
tant, since laser heating is of commercial interest
because of its ability to alter with accuracy the
properties of very localized surface regions without
reprocessing the material as a whole. However, it is
this scale of operation which makes in-situ accurate
predictions of the process variables so difficult. Con-
sequently, it is the change of the microstructures and
the mechanical as well as chemical properties of the
surface treated that matters. Therefore, modelling the
physical process can yield much insight into the
phenomena occurring within the region activated by
the high-power laser beam. It should be noted that
the modelling can reduce substantially the time re-
quired for process optimization, scale up, and con-
trol.
On the experimental side, considerable work has
been carded out to improve the surface properties of
engineering metals. Osawa et al. [4] studied the
effect of laser heat treatment on intergranular corro-
sion of anstenitic stainless steel. They have con-
cluded that corrosion properties improve consider-
ably after the laser heat treatment process~ Thermal
and microstructural analysis for laser surface harden-
ing of steel was carried out by Toyol and Mukherjee
[5]. They conducted a parametric study, in determin-
ing the most effecting parameters and developed a
correlation between hardness and laser process pa-
rameters. Li [6] investigated the application of laser
surface modification techniques for engine parts. He
showed that the properties of the engine parts proper-
ties improved considerably when treated by a laser
beam. The thermal effect of the graphite phase in
cast iron was investigated by Liu [7] using a laser
surface treatment technique. He demonstrated that
the graphite phase could not play the role as a
thermal sink during the laser heating process.
Although a number of conduction based heat
transfer models for laser surface treatment have been
presented previously [8-10] only a few [10,11] com-
pare the simulation results directly with experiments.
Analysis of heat conduction in deep penetration
welding with a time-modulated laser beam was in-
vestigated by Simon et al. [12]. They showed that the
time modulate laser beam had little influence on the
resulting heat affected zone. Square-shaped tempera-
ture distribution induced by a Gaussian-shaped laser
beam was investigated by Lu [13]. He demonstrated
that the square shape of the temperature profile was
almost of the same size as the original Gaussian
beam and did not depend on the incident laser power
and the substrate properties. Laser heating of a two-
layer system is studied by E1-Adawi et al. [14] using
the Laplace integral transformed method. The time
required for the melting of thin films situated on the
glass substance was computed. The results revealed
that the melting time strongly depended on the film
thermal properties. Heat conduction in a semi-in-
finite solid when subjected to a spatially decaying
instantaneous laser source was investigated by Zubair
and Chaudhry [15]. They identified the instantaneous
laser source by a Dirac function and showed that the
conduction effect was dominant as the dimensionless
distance ( x 6 ) increased. Diniz, Neto and Lima [16]
computed the temperature profiles inside the sub-
stance subjected to high intensity and short pulse
length laser irradiation using 3D heat conduction
equation. They discussed the applicability of the
model developed to the metals heated by a pulsed
Nd:YAG laser. Laser pulse heating for the conduc-
tion limited process was investigated by Yilbas [17]
who demonstrated that pulse frequencies of the order
of 1 kHz were needed for the integration of the
heating process, but left the prediction of cooling and
heating rates during the pulse heating.
In the light of the above arguments, the present
study is carried out to predict the temperature rise at
the surface and inside the material using a Fourier
heat transfer model for a step pulse input. Analytical
solutions are attempted to determine the heating and
cooling rates and, later, non-dimensional empirical
equations are developed in this regard. To validate
the theoretical predictions an experiment is con-
ducted to measure the surface temperature rise due to
Nd:YAG laser irradiation of steel substrate. Since the
Nd:YAG laser output pulse length is limited, three
 B.S. Yilbas,.S.Z Shuja/Applied SurfaceScience108 (1997) 167-175 169

pulse lengths are considered and these are introduced

in the theoretical predictions. (x
Xeffc 2 f ~ - 6f~- )
1
+ ~-g exp( o2t q- SX)
2. Analytical solution to the conduction heat
transfer process
X

The energy supplied to a material in laser machin-

ing is absorbed in the surface region according to
Lambert's law:

I = I 0 exp( - 6x) (1)

+ ~ 2 exp( - 6 x ) [ 1 - exp( oz620] 1
(4)
The absorption of an incident laser beam energy
results in an increase of the internal energy of the where
substance, which in turn initiates the conduction heat
transfer. Therefore, the Fourier heat conduction ap- 2 f ~ _~2
propriate to laser heating can be written as: erfc(x) = ~ Jx e dr/

knowing that
~x2]+AIotexp(-tx)=pCp(~t) (2)

where A is the absorption coefficient factor of the i e r f c ( x ) = f : e r f c ~ d~

substance and A = 1 - R , R being the reflectivity.
For most of the engineering materials the absorption 1
factor is almost unity for the Nd:YAG laser wave- - f-~ exp( - x 2) - x e r f c ( x )
length [18]. It should be noted that Eq. (2) assumes
constant thermal properties as well as a constant
absorption coefficient. Rearrangement of Eq. (2)
gives:

a2T IoSexp(-ax ) 1 aT
aX 2 "[- k c~ at (3)
o,
with the boundary conditions:

o
a-~x-xTx=0 = 0, T(m, t) = 0 and T( x, 0) = 0. 0 0.2 0.6 0.8 1 1.2
Time (gs}

The solution of Eq. (3) becomes visible in the laser output power

Laplace domain, i.e. it results:

I!=
laser head current

r(x, 0 = - - -

Time (0.2#s/div)

Xerfc + ~ g exp( ozS2t - - 6x) Fig. 1. (a) A typical laser output pulse used in the theory. (b)
Actual laser output pulse monitored during experiment.
170 B.S. Yilbas,.S.Z. Shuja/Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175

Rearrangement of Eq. (4) gives: It is evident that dT(x, t ) / d x shall only be zero
at the surface, i.e. the maximum temperature occurs
T( x, t) = ----!/at ierfc at the surface.
It should be noted that in computing the tempera-
Io ture profiles, the identical power intensity distribu-
k6 exp( - 6 x ) tion was used as it was resulted from the Nd;AG
laser. The Nd:YAG laser output power intensity
I0 distribution and the power intensity distribution used
+ 2k6exp(a62t- 6x)
in the present computation are shown in Fig. 1.
X

3. E x p e r i m e n t a l
10
+ e x p ( a 6 2 t + 6x)
2k6 The experimental }etup is shown in Fig. 2. A
Nd:YAG laser delivering output energy in the range
xerfc av' + (5) of 5 - 2 0 J within 1.48 ms pulses was used to irradi-
ate the target. An energy power meter was employed
Eq. (5) gives the temperature profile inside the in the path to measure the instantaneous laser output
material for a given laser beam power intensity. It power. A condensing lens of 51 mm nominal focal
should be noted that, as the time tends to infinity, length was used to focus the laser beam on the
lim T ( x , t) = oo surface of the workpiece. A graduated barrel holding
t-+co the focusing lens was used to vary the focus setting.
Therefore, no steady state solution exists for the Consequently, power intensities as high as 1012
temperature distribution. The growth of the tempera- W / m 2 can be achieved by varying the focus setting
ture at the surface with time may be obtained setting of the lens. To measure the surface temperature of
x = 0 into Eq. (5), i.e.: the laser heated spot, K-type thermocouples were
used. This was accomplished such that a hole of
T(O, t)
about 0.5 m m in diameter was drilled with a laser in
a workpiece. The twisted ends of the thermocouple
- I 2 +exp(o~-62t)erfc(&/--t)-I were inserted into the hole drilled. The workpiece
k6 r
surface and thermocouple tips were ground down to
(6) the same level and, later, welded with a laser beam.
To avoid the influence of the magnetic field gener-
Differentiation of Eq. (5) with x gives the tem-
perature gradient inside the material, i.e.

a T ( x, t) I exp( - 6x) - erfc I NdYAGlaser

dx k
l / Oscilloscope
I0
- 2--~exp( a 6 s t - 6x)

---~-" ( a 6 2 t + 6x)
+ ~/expzK

Thermocouple
Xerfc 6 v r ~ + (7) Junction
Fig. 2. Experimentalsetup.
 B.S. Yilbas, .S.Z. Shuja /Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175 171

steel

0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000
x8

nickel

time
Fig. 3. Thermocouple output.

0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000
ated by the laser power supply, two glass slides were XS

used to shield the workpiece and the thermocoup!e

tantalum
junction. A typical thermocouple output is shown in
Fig. 3. To examine the effect of the pulse length on
the temperature profiles, three pulse lengths were
introduced including 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 /xs. The selec-
tion of the pulse length was limited to the availabil-
ity of Nd:YAG laser output pulse.
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 9oo 1000
x~

Fig. 4. Variation of temperature with time inside the material.

4. Discussions

Fig. 4 shows the temperature distribution pre- minimum value, in this case, the energy gain due to
dicted inside four different materials at different incident laser beam balances the conduction losses,
heating times. In general, the slope of the tempera- i.e. the internal energy of the substance remains
ture curves reduces as the heating progresses. When almost constant. In this case, the dimensionless dis-
comparing the temperature profiles corresponding to tance (x r) corresponding to this point may be de-
different materials it is evident that the material fined as the equilibrium distance and dT/dx be-
having low thermal diffusivity and absorption coeffi- c o m e s (dT/dx)min. In the third region the slope
cient results in steep temperature curves (Fig. 5), i.e. increases to reach almost zero. In this region conduc-
tantalum has a steeper temperature profile compared
to those corresponding to the other materials.
The variation of dT/dx with dimensionless length
(xfi) is shown in Fig. 6 for different materials. In
general, the slope of the curves decreases reaching
the minimum and then increases to attain almost zero
where the temperature profile becomes almost
asymptotic with x r. In this case, the behavior of
dT/dx with x6 may be distinguished into three
regions which are indicated in Fig. 6. In the first
region, the heat gain due to laser irradiation domi-
nates the conduction losses; i.e. the internal energy
increase is considerably high as compared to conduc- x~

tion losses. In the second region the slope has a Fig. 5. Temperature profile inside the materials.
172 B.S. Yilbas, .S.Z. Shuja /Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175

Fig. 7 shows the variation of (dT/dx)mi n with the

dimensionless equilibrium distance (Xt~)eq. AS the
, +\& I I ,i : ! i .~
heating time increases the equilibrium distance in-
i 5;\5. i i i ; i;" /
creases and the variation of (dT/dx)mi n with (X6)eq

%
, i/}i t follows the laser heating pulse. As the heating pulse
increases ( d T / d X)eq reduces while (x 6 )eq increases.
However; at the tall of the heating pulse, both
(dT/dX)eq a n d (X~)e q increase. In this case, the
t I "'-.-.--4"" / conduction process inside the substance becomes
",,t I / i dominant. On the other hand, Fig, 8 shows the
"20 i ~ I \ 1 ~Region E I I . / f ~ i
variation of (x6)eq with (oz62t). This variation is
Ix"-.... I_ J
also in logarithmic form, therefore, the power rela-
-250.0i 0,1 1 100 1000 tion can be developed for the equilibrium distance
x6 and time, and it may be written as:
Fig. 6. Variation of d T / d x with dimensionless distance x&
(x~)~q = C[a~2t] m

tion losses are dominant and the energy gain due to where C is the constant and m is the power of the
the external field is insignificant, i.e. the internal dimensionless time.
energy decreases as the dimensionless distance in- This empirical relation is also true for the other
creases. When comparing the four materials, the materials employed in the calculations. It is evident
variation of d T / d x corresponding to tantalum is the that the effect of the pulse length is insignificant on
highest. This may again be due to the thermal prop- the variation of (x6)eq with a62t. This may be due
erties of tantalum, which has low thermal diffusivity, to the pulse lengths selected in the present study, i.e.
low absorption depth and high density. they are close in value.

OE+O0

-5E+07

-1E+08

-2E+08

-2E+08

-3E+08
4.5 5 5.5 6 6.5
(x~)~u~

Fig. 7. Variation of ( d T / d X)eq with equilibrium distance (x 6 )~q.

 B.S. Yilbas, .S.Z Shuja /Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175 173

relation between the dimensionless equilibrium time

and the dimensionless equilibrium distance, i.e.:
--- ~,_ i -i- __~

io/ a oq = C(xa)e

where C is the Constant and m is the power. It is also

0 2oo00 ~000 6o0oo 8o0oo
~t
Fig. 8. V a r i a t i o n o f e q u i l i b r i u m distance ( x 6 ) e q w i t h d i m e n s i o n -
less t i m e ( ~ 3 2 t) f o r d i f f e r e n t pulse lengths.
Fig. 10 shows the dimensionless equilibrium tem-
perature ((T(x, t)/Io/k6)eq) with equilibrium dis-
tance (x 6)eq. The equilibrium temperature is defined
as the temperature where dT/dx is minimum. The
relation between (T(x, t)/Io/k6)eq and (X6)eq on
the logarithmic scale is linear for all the materials
and pulse lengths. This leads to develop a power
evident that the effect of the pulse length on (T(x,
t)/(Io/k~3))eq with (x~)eq is insignificant as ex-
1ooooo 120000 ~ 4000c
plained earlier.
It is expected that increase in heating time in-
creases the equilibrium distance, which in turn in-
creases the dimensionless equilibrium temperature.
Fig. 9 shows the variation of T(0. t)/(Io/k6)
with oz62t. Three distinct regions are visible. In the
first region, for 0 _< c ~ 2t < 4000, the surface tem-
perature increases very rapidly with time. This corre-
sponds to initial heating of the surface layers of the
material, where the conduction losses from the sur-
face are low, and follows from a consideration of the
rate of change of temperature with time. In the
region 4000 < oe62t < 20000. the rate of change of
temperature begins to fall off, indicating that the
conduction process is playing a larger part in the

1000
I i

y = 0.0065x 5~z8 ; I I -- I
R2 = 0.9991

I
I
/ I

100 t

x
steel
nickel
E
&tantalum
' r ! I
I I
! ]
EI ii
10
10

(x~)equ~
Fig. 9. V a r i a t i o n o f ( T ( x , t)/(lo/k6))eq with e q u i l i b r i u m d i s t a n c e ( X 6 ) e q.
174 B.S. Yilbas,.S.Z. Shuja/Applied Surface Science 108 (1997) 167-175

450
time of the pulse is much greater than this equilib-
400 =
350 : : : 1,1 a ; - r l
rium time. Since for most metals 10 6 _< 6 _< 108 1 / m
300 I~
:'7i i i i i ' ' and a = 10 -5 m2/s, then t r -~ 10 -5 s. For the laser
_% 250 pulsed heating process, where the pulse length is of
~--~
&
g-
200 - - - - - - tantalum the order of 10 -5 s, the material may be expected to
156 . . . . . . . nickel
follow the form of the incident pulse, whereas for
100 - - - - - - steel i
~ C ~ 1 I I I I I experimental Q-switched lasers whose pulse length is approxi-
Iii111111 /
50t/ I I I [ I : I I I ; [ ; I
oF4--tll~l~llll~ll mately 10 -9 s this may not be so and the analysis of
0 20000 40000 60000 80000 100000 120000 140000
the heat transfer process using the Fourier equation
a~2t
becomes invalid, in this case the heating process
4~o ! l N would be non-equilibrium. It is evident from Fig. 10
400 i:~ ='~ ==
that the both results predicted and obtained from the
300 .= = experiment are in good agreement. The small varia-
% 250 tion may be due to the measurement errors.
~" 200
o" .= ! ---- - - tantalum
~" 150 ~ -- - ..... nickel
100 .... steel
50 III experimental 5. Conclusions
0 , ::::!
20000 40000 60000 800{]0 100000 120000 140000

~zt The equilibrium time (tr = C/ol6 2) exists for a

0 20000 40000 60000
Ct62t
Fig. 10. Variation of dimensionless surface temperature T(0,
t)/(Io/k3) with dimensionless time (a62t) for three materials
and experiments.
energy transfer process for oz62t > 1.0, the curve is
almost linear, indicating that the relative levels of the
energy storage and conduction effects are reaching a
balance. Although the temperatures in the material
do not at any time reach a steady value, it follows
that in this sense an equilibrium condition is reached
when
given material, in this case, the balance occurs be-
tween the internal energy gain d u e to laser irradia-
tion and the conduction losses. T h e equilibrium dis-
tance (xr)~q increases with heating time. This is true
for all the materials considered. The dimensionless
equilibrium temperature (T(x, t)/(Io/kr))~q is a
function of equilibrium distance. This function is
found to be in the form of a power relation, and the
80000 100000 120000 140000
constant and the power of this relation have the same
value for all the materials considered.
The predicted and experimentally measured sur-
face temperatures are found to be in a good agree-
ment. The small variation in both results may be due
to experimental error. The effect of the pulse length
on the equilibrium time is found to be significant.
This may be limited to the pulse length used in the
present study. However, based on the material re-
spond to the incident pulse, the Fourier analysis may
not be valid for some materials heated by a Q-
switched lasers, in this case, the rise time of the
incident pulse is so fast that the heat transfer process
may no longer be an equilibrium process.

O{ 6 2 t ---~ 20000
In this case, T(0, t ) / ( l o / k r ) = 160. This implies References
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