Mechanical Engineering Commons^™

Surface Topography Formation And Thermographic Analysis In Laser Polishing Of H13 Tool Steel, Joshua D. Miller

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Laser polishing, in its simplest form, is the melting of a small layer of material via laser radiation. This creates a small molten pool which is re-distrusted across the surface, resulting in a much smoother finished surface. Although this process has been around for decades now, there has been a recent insurgence into industrial applications. Despite this, the phenomena that occur during the process are still not fully understood. Therefore, increasing the knowledge surrounding the process would be ideal.

To accomplish this, various input parameters of the process are altered to analyze the effect on the finished polished surface. Through …