Marking of bearing balls without damaging the surface

In cooperation with a Czech integrator, we prepared a solution for testing the quality of production of steel bearing balls with a diameter in the range of 2 - 20 mm. The task of Optixs was to design a laser device that would be able to mark the thinnest possible line on the bearing balls without damaging the surface of the ball, simply by annealing.

The Coherent PowerLine F20 Varia fibre laser in the following configuration was chosen for the project:

PowerLine F laser

• The PowerLine F laser range includes innovative fibre lasers with different power ranges. All systems provide pulse energy of 1 mJ with fast on time and high peak power over a wide range of repetition rates. The average emitted power of the laser can be adjusted using a fiber amplifier.
• The adjustable pulse width of the PowerLine F 20 Varia & F 50 Varia lasers ensures perfect results even in demanding applications.
• Specific versions of the product range are available for applications in the semiconductor industry (e.g. PowerLine F IC) and document security (PowerLine F PC).

Function overview

• Different performance ranges for different applications
• Completely air-cooled
• Low operating costs
• Single and double galvanic drive
• Compact laser head

Conclusion

The marking line width on the steel ball bearing is ~20-35 μm (stainless steel). Creating a wider line is possible by adjusting the marking parameters. The marking height is ~ 0.02 - 0.2 μm, this value is difficult to measure due to the height of the surface structure of the balls.