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Endoscopes are made of small thin-walled metal tubes and sheets. Endoscopes have to go through a large number of sterilization cycles during their lifetime, so they cannot be joined using adhesives or soldering and brazing. In addition, the joint must not be corroded or degraded throughout the lifetime of the endoscope.

Solutions

Laser welding is nowadays a proven and ideal solution. Coherent offers laser systems that are precisely tailored to this application and yet open to further applications in medical facilities. Laser solutions for this application range from systems with simple manual controls for prototyping and single piece production to fully automated CNC production tools. These are capable of producing spot welds, seam welds and gas-tight welds much smaller than 1 mm with excellent surface quality that requires no post-processing. And because the pulsed laser can be focused on a very small spot - with our MicroWeld™ technology < 0.1 mm in diameter - the welding process does not cause significant heating of the surrounding metal substrate.

Coherent offers three different types of integrated systems that provide cost-optimized features for different levels of the medical product lifecycle: from initial prototypes to mass production. These systems can be defined by the level of automation:

  • Coherent Performance Unlimited - manual welding system
  • Coherent Select - semi-automated system with 4-axis motion control
  • Coherent ExactWeld - fully automated CNC machine

Benefits

By reducing process bottlenecks, these tools allow both experts and novices to take full advantage of this unique and flexible joining technology. These easy-to-use laser-based tools allow manual or fully automated welding of stainless steel pipe and sheet metal with the precision and surface quality required by the application, with a choice of price levels to suit your specific needs.