EXPERIMENTAL AND NUMERICAL INVESTIGATION OF LASER FORMING OF A DOUBLY CURVED SADDLE SHAPE WITH SPIRAL IRRADIATING SCHEME

In this work, laser forming of a doubly curved saddle shape was investigated experimentally and numerically. Experimental tests were carried out with a continuous wave CO2 laser of 150 Watts maximum power. Numerical simulations were also performed using commercial finite element package ABAQUS/ Implicit. Experimental and numerical results showed that a doubly curved saddle shape could be produced successfully with spiral irradiating scheme. In addition, the numerical results weree in good agreement with experimental observations. The experimental and numerical results yielded that curvatures associated with obtained saddle shape was considerably large and a considerable and suitable symmetry was produced in the obtained saddle shape with spiral irradiating scheme. Spiral irradiating scheme was indeed a powerful and suitable path to produce a doubly curved saddle shape with considerable amounts of curvatures and symmetries.