Laser Welding Characterization of Kovar and Stainless Steel Alloys as Suitable Materials for Components of Photonic Devices Packaging

The weldability of Kovar and stainless steel alloys by Nd:YAG laser beam is studied through changing of some laser beam parameters. It has been found that there is a suitable interaction of the pulsed laser beam of low power laser pulse with both the two alloys. The change of thermophysical properties with absorbed energy from the laser pulse is discussed in this paper which reports the suitability of both Kovar and stainless steel 304 as the base materials for photonic devices packaging. We used laser weld system (LW4000S from Newport) which employs Nd:YAG laser system with two simultaneous beams output for packaging 980 rim high power laser module. Results of changing both laser spot weld width and penetration depth with changing both the pulse peak power density, pulse energy and pulse duration show that there are good linear relationships between laser pulse energy or peak power density and pulse duration with laser spot weld dimensions( both laser spot weld width and penetration depth). Therefore we concluded that there should be an optimization for both the pulse peak power and pulse duration to give a suitable aspect ratio (laser spot width to penetration depth) for achieving the desired welds with suitable penetration depth and small spot width. This is to reduce the heat affected zone (HAZ) which affects the sensitive optical components. An optimum value of the power density in the order of 10(5) w/cm(2) found to be suitable to induce melting in the welded joints without vaporization. The desired ratio can also be optimized by changing the focus position on the target material as illustrated from our measurements. A theoretical model is developed to simulate the temperature distribution during the laser pulse heating and predict the penetration depth inside the material. Samples have been investigated using SEM with EDS. The metallographic measurements on the weld spot show a suitable weld yield with reasonable weld width to depth ratio.