The previous article introduced the functions and advantages of handheld laser cleaning machines. Today, let's explore how handheld laser cleaning machines can be used in everyday life.
Laser cleaning has a wide range of applications, mainly including the following industries:
1. Rail Transit: Railway tracks are laid in open environments and are easily rusted (or accumulate dirt) due to rain, sun exposure, and other factors. Severe rust and dirt buildup on the rail surface and inner side can cause poor circuit routing, affecting railway signal transmission and endangering train safety.
Currently, two main methods are used to remove rust and dirt from operating rails: manual grinding and large rail rust removal and grinding machines. Manual grinding is the primary method for rail maintenance, but it is labor-intensive, difficult to operate, inefficient, easily damages the rails, and the cleaning quality is difficult to guarantee. Large-scale rail rust removal and grinding machines are powerful and bulky, requiring their own generators and locomotives for operation. Prior to operation, transportation plans are needed, and on-site work occupies track, affecting train traffic. Furthermore, the costs are high, and there is a significant impact on the surrounding environment. Laser cleaning, on the other hand, is a new cleaning method that has emerged in recent years. Laser cleaning equipment is suitable for individual operation, has low costs, is environmentally friendly, highly efficient, provides high-quality cleaning without damaging the rail substrate, does not require railway transportation plans, and can be easily operated with one hand or automatically via remote control. These advantages are irreplaceable by existing cleaning methods, and laser cleaning will gradually replace traditional methods; its development prospects are undoubtedly promising.
2. Laser Cleaning Equipment in Automobile Manufacturing: In automobile manufacturing, the use of drawing lubricants or cooling lubricants and rust inhibitors can contaminate automotive components, severely reducing the quality of subsequent high-energy joining or bonding processes. Welds and bonds in powertrain components must meet stringent quality standards; therefore, thorough cleaning of the joint surfaces is essential. Traditional cleaning methods are very time-consuming, cannot be automated, and often have harmful environmental impacts. Laser cleaning, with its speed and automation, can thoroughly remove surface residues, resulting in strong, gap-free, and micro-crack-free welds and bonds. Furthermore, laser cleaning is gentle and significantly faster than other methods, advantages that have gained recognition in the automotive industry. In industrial applications, paint is typically applied to protect metals or other substrate materials, providing rust, oxidation, and corrosion protection. When paint peels off or needs repainting for other reasons, the original paint layer must be completely cleaned. In the automotive industry, before major vehicle repairs, old paint needs to be removed to prepare for new paint application. Traditional vehicle paint cleaning methods are numerous, primarily mechanical and chemical. Mechanical methods include high-pressure water jet removal, sandblasting, and steel brush polishing, while chemical methods mainly involve chemical reagents. These methods suffer from drawbacks such as high cost, high energy consumption, potential pollution, and damage to the substrate surface, gradually failing to meet modern environmental requirements for cleaning methods. In response, many new cleaning technologies have emerged, with laser cleaning, as a key method, increasingly demonstrating its superiority. Selective removal, no substrate damage, and rapid cleaning rate are key advantages of laser paint cleaning.
3. Petrochemical Industry: In the petrochemical industry, equipment operates in harsh environments for extended periods, making it prone to corrosion and rust, severely impacting performance. Solvents and emulsions used to clean pipe surfaces only remove oil, grease, and dust, failing to remove rust, scale, and other contaminants. Abrasive cleaning with wire brushes is labor-intensive, polluting, and inefficient. Laser cleaning technology effectively solves these problems.
4. Molds: Molds are essential machinery in tire production, directly affecting tire quality. Tire molds contain intricate patterns and markings, requiring delicate engraving techniques. However, molds are repeatedly used under high pressure and high temperature conditions, inevitably becoming contaminated by the combined deposits of rubber, compounding agents, and release agents used in the vulcanization process (the main contaminants are sulfides, inorganic oxides, silicone oil, carbon black, etc.). Rubber and residues easily accumulate in the tread and groove areas, and when this accumulation reaches a certain level, it affects the surface shape of the tire, rendering the product substandard or scrap. Therefore, frequent cleaning of the molds is essential to ensure their surface cleanliness, guaranteeing tire quality and mold lifespan.
On the other hand, hundreds of millions of tires are manufactured worldwide each year. Cleaning tire molds during production must be rapid and reliable to minimize downtime. Traditional methods such as chemical cleaning agents, high-pressure water cleaning, and dry ice cleaning suffer from drawbacks including high labor intensity, low efficiency, low safety, and high cost. Therefore, the tire manufacturing industry urgently needs a high-efficiency, low-cost cleaning technology. Laser cleaning technology offers significant advantages such as high efficiency, low cost, and no damage to the molds. It also allows for online cleaning operations and ensures operator safety. Compared to traditional cleaning methods, laser cleaning significantly improves cleaning quality and efficiency, solves the problems of traditional methods, and fully meets the requirements of rapid and reliable tire cleaning.
5. New Energy Batteries: The manufacturing of lithium-ion batteries includes three parts: electrode manufacturing, cell fabrication, and battery assembly. Adding laser cleaning to these three processes can greatly improve the battery manufacturing process.
Laser Cleaning Before Electrode Coating: The positive and negative electrodes of lithium batteries are formed by coating lithium battery electrode materials onto a thin metal strip. During the coating process, the metal strip needs to be cleaned. The metal strip is typically made of aluminum or copper. Traditional wet ethanol cleaning can easily damage other components of the lithium battery. Laser dry cleaning machines effectively solve these problems.
Laser Cleaning Before Battery Welding: Pulsed lasers are used to directly irradiate and remove contaminants, causing the surface temperature to rise and expand. This thermal expansion causes the contaminants or substrate to vibrate, thus overcoming surface adhesion and detaching from the substrate surface, achieving the purpose of removing surface stains. This method effectively removes dirt and dust from the terminal faces of battery cells, preparing them for welding and reducing defective products.
Laser cleaning during battery assembly: To prevent safety accidents in lithium batteries, external adhesive is typically applied to the battery cells for insulation, preventing short circuits, protecting circuitry, and preventing scratches. Laser cleaning of the insulating plates and terminal plates cleans the cell surface, roughens the surface, and improves the adhesion of adhesives. Furthermore, it does not produce harmful pollutants, making it an environmentally friendly green cleaning method, which is increasingly important given the global focus on environmental protection.
6. Laser rust removal in the semiconductor industry: Currently, with the continuous advancement of semiconductor technology, advanced integrated circuit devices have shifted from planar to three-dimensional structures. Integrated circuit manufacturing processes are becoming increasingly complex, often requiring hundreds or even thousands of process steps. In advanced semiconductor device manufacturing, each process inevitably leaves some particulate contaminants, metal residues, or organic residues on the silicon wafer surface. The continuous shrinking of device feature sizes and the increasing complexity of three-dimensional device structures make semiconductor devices increasingly sensitive to particulate contamination, impurity concentration, and quantity. This places higher demands on the cleaning technology for contaminating microparticles on the mask surface of silicon wafers. The key is overcoming the strong adhesion between contaminating microparticles and the substrate. Traditional chemical, mechanical, and ultrasonic cleaning methods cannot meet these requirements, while laser cleaning can easily solve this type of contamination problem.
Furthermore, as the size of integrated circuit devices continues to shrink, material loss and surface roughness during the cleaning process become critical concerns. Removing particles without material loss or pattern damage is a fundamental requirement. Laser cleaning technology offers unparalleled advantages over traditional cleaning methods, including non-contact operation, no thermal effects, no surface damage to the cleaned object, and no secondary pollution. It is the ideal cleaning method for semiconductor device contamination.
The global market demand for industrial cleaning products and equipment is growing rapidly. Therefore, the quality, cleaning effectiveness, and environmental impact of cleaning products and equipment are becoming increasingly important. As product quality continues to improve, assessing its environmental impact has become commonplace, and many industries are studying how to optimize cleaning practices in automated linear production.