Influence of Powder Feed Rate on the Outflow Field in Laser Cladding on a Four-Channel Coaxial Powder Feeding Nozzle
S.R. Guo, Q.Q. Yin, L.J. Cui, Y.H. Cui, X.L. LI, B. Zheng, Y.L. Cao and W.H. Zeng
To research the influence of powder feed rate on the outflow field of a high power diode laser (HPDL) coaxial powder feeding nozzle, FLUENT software was adopted to simulate the outflow field of powder flow under different powder feeding rates. Results show that the higher the powder feeding rate was, the higher powder flow velocity and concentration were at the convergence point, but the focal length was maintained at 0.015 m. When the powder feeding rate was 15 g/min, the powder had a good aggregation property. When the rate of powder feeding exceeded 15 g/ min, the spot diameter increased. The experiment of powder convergence and laser cladding forming was carried out by using four-channel coaxial powder feeding nozzles. It was found that the best forming effect is achieved when the powder feeding rate was 15 g/min, which was consistent with simulation results and had a high reference significance for optimization of process parameters of the coaxial nozzle.
Keywords: High power diode laser (HPDL), carbon steel, 45 steel, powder, laser cladding, coaxial powder feeding, outflow field, gas-solid two-phase flow, convergent properties, optimization