Cutting Metal with a Desktop Laser

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When I saw the video of the Atomstack 20w diode laser slicing a piece of stainless steel I instantly said "FAKE" like literally I yelled at my screen. Everything and everyone always tells me how diode lasers cannot cut anything especially not metal. Well if that is the case maybe it is time to rename what we are calling the 20w xTool Pro because this thing continues to concur all the test I throw at it. With the ability to manipulate steel my mind is exploding with new product ideas that have yet to be attempted.

link to laser used in this video

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Chad's Air Assist Kit

Metals used in video
.001"-.008" able to cut

Too Thick to cut

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link to laser used in this video

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The best deals of the year! UP TO 50% OFF!

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Chad's Air Assist Kit

[krisknowlton]

You can use the soot from a candle to mark stainless steel. Just light a candle and run the stainless steel thru the flame. It will leave black soot on the ss. Just laser and wash off the soot. It's cheap and easy and does a good job.

[johnmiller]

I used to work a lot with laser welding machines. 1) Diode lasers are continuous wave lasers. Look up CW power levels for materials to be cut. 2) Angle you head about 3 degrees from perpendicular. This will help prevent any back spatter to the lens. 3) Use an inert atmosphere instead of air to minimize surface discoloration. 4)most importantly, the light must melt the material. Therefore the thicker and higher conductivity the material has, the harder to cut. Aluminum and copper has much higher conductivities than steel. You won't cut .002 copper. Question: What wavelength of light is your laser?

[sethstewart]

Pro-tip. You can mark the material with a red sharpie, and it will help overcome the reflectivity for your first pass. It's pretty universal when we're cutting parts out in the jewelry industry.

[SamChaneyProductions]

I would love to see if you can cut through thin titanium. Being able to make titanium veneers that I could anodize and inlay into knives would be amazing

[antronk]

Thermal conductivity seems to be a determining factor. The more conductive, the worst the material cuts. That would explain why it couldn't cut through aluminium or copper, and why stainless (being the worst thermal conductor here) did the best.
I reckon the explanation could be that the heat gets dissipatef in the best conducting materials rather than staying focused on the laser point, hence preventing the cut

[shawnmurray]

Now they (Atomstack) have a 14 diode 70W laser supposedly coming out around end of March / beginning of April. It purportedly uses 6W diode modules (which would technically be max of 84W) combined into a single beam. It's claimed to cut 0.3mm (0.118" / 11ga) stainless steel in one single pass, has a 800*850mm working area, and automatic laser focus. BUT it has a much larger focused spot than my Atomstack X7 Pro, even in 1/2 power mode @ Spot Size: 0.12*0.18mm (70W) / 0.08mm*0.12mm (35W) - my X7 Pro spot size is claimed to be 0.06mm x 0.06mm ....

[blueskyjax]

Grateful for folks like you doing all the testing! Thank you! Great links

[GeorgiaWoodsHomesteading]

The downside of sharing a YouTube channel with your spouse, they watch videos where I miss the notifications. It has been 3 months and I did not know about this! AJ is in trouble 😁 great video as always, you have a true talent.

[jeremiebilisari]

I have a theory as to the reason it can cut the steels but not the other materials. I think it may be due to their thermal conductivity values. Steel and Stainless Steel have very low thermal conductivity, so the energy from the laser isn't dissipating through the sheet and stays confined near the laser point. The other materials you tried to cut (brass, copper, and aluminum) all have much higher thermal conductivity values, so the energy spreads out from the laser point and in turn isn't sufficient to cut or even mar the material. I'd be interested to see if maybe Bronze (75% Cu, 25% Sn) or Titanium could be cut with the laser, as they have a similarly low thermal conductivity value as steel.

[OffGridOverLander]

It’s not about reflectivity for the materials, it’s about the material itself and how well they can transfer heat. Aluminum and copper are great heat conductors, which why they’ve been used as radiators in cars. Steel is one of the worst for thermal conductivity which is why you can cut it.

[TMS]

most metals are almost 100% reflective at 10600nm (co2 laser). once you get up into 1064nm or higher, the reflectivity is "only" like 90-95% so you can actually get power into the materials.

[russwilliams]

Stainless Steel is a really special case for this, it's ridiculously non-conductive for heat (~15W/m/K). Normal steel (~45W/m/K), brass (~111W/m/K), aluminium (~240W/m/K), or copper (~385W/m/K) are far more thermally conductive and will carry the heat away too quickly. Your goal is to put energy in so quickly that the metal vaporises before the heat can be conducted away.

[MKCraftsandFamily]

Awesome idea for the tape for placement!! Thanks for all the testing! 🥰

[GearTestTV]

Chad! Thanks for this video! Currently looking into the X20 Pro and this answered all of my questions about the capabilities.

[ChrisPowellFSD]

Atomstack sent me a sheet of stainless to use as a wasteboard to prevent burning your table. Even with my 10 watt lasers, it ended up with some pretty deep engravings. It warped like crazy and wasn’t usable after a while.

[siukcnc]

Try cutting the aluminium through a film coating, not sure the one on it is right, but most of the panels cut on laser have an opaque film 'laser film' to stop the reflection.

[melgross]

Most diode lasers will “mark” metal, meaning that it will etch metal by a fraction of a thousandth of an inch. The more power, and the slower the speed, the deeper it will cut. It’s close to the right frequency. Thin metal without conductive support touching it will cut pretty easily. Going over it twice will be even better. 20 watts of power is getting to a useful number. When they get to 40 next year, it will work well. Not thick metal, you need several hundred watts for that, or more.

Stainless and that polished steel. isn’t more reflective than that aluminum. The problem is that stainless has poor thermal conductivity, so the heat stays with the laser cut. Steel is better, but still is just moderately conductive. But aluminum and particularly copper have much better conductivity so the heat quickly spreads from the cut, and you need much more power.

[sethstewart]

Some tips for those cutting metal:
Take as many passes as you need. Most machines can't cut metal in a single pass, and even if they can it'll leave some burs. Lower your power, increase passes to cut down on bur cleanup. It might take 50 passes. In some cases I've done over 500. But your final product will be good.
If your surface is too reflective, remove its reflectivity. Polish it later. Once you break through the first layer, reflectivity won't be an issue due to the laser's blackening effect.
If you get warping, your material is too hot. Lower power. Take some time between passes. Take even more passes.
Remember, your laser is a tool, not a solution.

[JSGilbert]

Just to understand thicknesses, household aluminum foil is between .016 and .024 mm in thickness. I believe the use cases for cutting metal with a diode laser are pretty small. Still, good to know.