JPH066237B2 - Laser cutting device - Google Patents

Description

Description: FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a laser cutting device for cutting a material by means of a relative movement of a laser beam and the material to be cut, and in particular to supporting the material to be cut. Related to the configuration for doing.

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, as a cutting device using a laser beam, a device in which a material to be cut is placed on a honeycomb conveyor is disclosed in JP-B-51-4.
No. 0677 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 49-85692 disclose that a net-like cloth cutting member is arranged on a cutting table.

In these prior arts, the material supporting means is a honeycomb structure having supporting blades having a small supporting area of the material or a structure similar thereto in order to suppress reflection of a laser beam at the supporting portion as much as possible. However, in these conventional techniques, since the honeycomb structure or a structure similar to the honeycomb structure is adopted, the structure is inevitably complicated and the cost is high. Further, if the combustion products of the cutting material adhere to the material supporting portion, it is difficult to remove the adhered material, and the material supporting portion is thin, so that it is easily deformed by an external force during the removing work. .

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION Problems to be Solved by the Invention The present invention solves the above-mentioned problems of the prior art, and simplifies the means for supporting the material to be cut, and enables the material to be cut to be supported in a stable state. It is to be.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore, according to the present invention, there is provided at least one support plate for absorbing a laser beam on at least an upper surface of a material support means capable of placing a material to be cut on the support plate. And a reinforcing plate that reflects light, and a large number of through holes are uniformly provided in these plate members in the irradiation direction of the laser beam.

As the material of the support plate that absorbs the laser beam, an acrylic plate is effective in the case of carbon dioxide laser beam, and as the material of the reinforcing plate that reflects the laser beam, punching metal made of steel plate is preferable. If the shape of the material to be cut changes each time, it is sufficient if the support plate for absorbing the laser beam is provided on the upper surface of the material supporting means. However, in the case of cutting the same shape repeatedly, if the upper surface is composed of only the supporting plate that absorbs the laser beam, the upper surface of the supporting plate may be cut into a groove shape. If a plate-shaped reinforcing plate that reflects a laser beam is attached to the back side of the support plate, even if the support plate that absorbs the laser beam on the front side is cut into a groove shape, the reinforcing plate that reflects the laser beam on the back side is not cut, The material support means will function as a support means for a relatively long time.

Configuration of Embodiment Hereinafter, the configuration of the present invention will be described in detail based on an embodiment shown in the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 shows a laser cutting device 1 of the present invention. This laser cutting device 1 includes a processing head 3 for emitting a laser beam 2, and a material supporting means 5 for planarly supporting a material to be cut, that is, a material to be cut 4 such as cloth.

The processing head 3 is moved along the guide rail 7 of the machine base 6 in the Y direction.
A beam 8 movable in a direction and a saddle 9 movable in the X direction along the beam 8 are attached downward, and a laser beam 2 is irradiated toward a material 4 to be cut. The laser beam 2 is emitted from a laser oscillator 10 and is guided to the processing head 3 via a beam bender 11 attached to one end of the beam 8 and a beam bender 12 attached to an upper end portion of the processing head 3.

On the other hand, on the upper surface of the machine stand 6, a spreading area 13, a cutting area 14 and a post-processing area 15 are sequentially formed, and the material supporting means 5 is incorporated over the respective areas.

FIG. 2 shows a part of the material supporting means 5. The material supporting means 5 of this embodiment is composed of a single layer of a support plate 16 made of acrylic resin, and the conveyor chain 1
It is supported by 7 so that it can run in the Y direction. That is, the conveyor chain 17 has an endless shape and is wound around a pair of left and right chain wheels 18 provided on the side of the extension area 13 of the machine base 6 and the end of the post-processing area 15, and the above-mentioned support is provided. The plate 16 is attached to a steel plate frame 19 in a state of being divided for each link of the conveyor chain 17. The frame 19 made of a steel plate is in an open state on the upper and lower surfaces, and is attached in a bridging state between the corresponding links of the conveyor chain 17 in the facing state. In addition, through holes 20 are formed in the support plate 16 at predetermined intervals.
Are uniformly formed in the irradiation direction of.

In the cutting area 14, a smoke collecting duct 21 is provided inside the machine base 6. The smoke collecting duct 21 is open at the lower surface of the material supporting means 5, and is connected to the suction blower 23 via the smoke exhausting duct 22. The smoke exhaust duct 22 is branched in the middle, and the smoke at the time of cutting is also sucked in from the inside of the cover 24 which is covered on the upper surface of the cutting area 14.

The machining head 3 is controlled in the X-Y directions by the numerical controller 25, and the operation panel 26 can be used to input data.

Operation of Embodiment Next, the operation of the laser cutting device 1 will be described. The material 4 to be cut such as cloth is guided to the portion of the cutting area 14 through the spreading area 13 while being wound in a roll shape. The feeding operation of the material to be cut 4 is performed by the movement of the conveyor chain 17 in the feeding direction, and the material is stopped at a predetermined position. During this period, the blower 23 sucks the air in the smoke collecting duct 21 to hold the material to be cut 4 on the upper surface of the support plate 16 in a stationary state.

In this state, the processing head 3 condenses the laser beam 2 at the position of the material 4 to be cut, and cuts the material 4 to be cut into a predetermined shape by the energy of the laser beam 2. At this time, since the energy of the laser beam 2 is set to be slightly higher than the minimum energy required for cutting the material to be cut 4, the laser beam 2 cuts the material 4 to be cut, and then the excess energy thereof is cut. Reaches the support plate 16 made of acrylic resin. Since this support plate 16 is a material that absorbs the laser beam 2 of carbon dioxide gas well, it absorbs the excess energy and thermally decomposes it. In the process of this thermal decomposition,
A shallow groove is formed on the upper surface of the support plate 16. Processing head 3
This groove is continuously formed on the upper surface of the support plate 16 with the movement of.

In this way, since the laser beam 2 is hardly reflected from the support plate 16, the material 4 to be cut is not adversely affected by the reflection of the laser beam 2. On the contrary,
When a material such as a metal plate that reflects the laser beam 2 is used instead of the support plate 16 made of an acrylic resin as in the conventional technique, the extra energy is reflected and the reflected beam deviates from the vertical direction. However, the reflected light beam irradiates the material 4 to be cut by another portion from the back side by the amount of the deviation, so that accurate cutting of a beautiful shape becomes impossible. Therefore, as already mentioned,
Efforts have been made to minimize the reflected light of a laser beam by using a honeycomb structure made of aluminum.
Therefore, the supporting portion cannot be thickened and is easily deformed by an external force.

On the other hand, since the support plate 16 is provided with a large number of through holes 20 in the irradiation direction of the laser beam 2, the material to be cut 4 and the gas generated from the support plate 16 at the time of cutting cut through these through holes 20. Are collected in the smoke collecting duct 21 via the exhaust pipe and discharged to the outside through the smoke exhausting duct 22. Further, as described above, this exhaust causes the material to be cut 4 to move to the supporting plate 16
Since it is fixed on the upper part by air adsorption, the material 4 to be cut can be surely prevented from shifting during cutting. Thus, the through hole 20 of the support plate 16 has two functions of exhausting exhaust gas and adsorbing and fixing the material 4 to be cut.

In this way, the cut material 4 cut into a predetermined shape
Is transferred from the cutting area 14 to the post-processing area 15 by moving to the conveyor chain 17. Here, necessary processing is performed on the cut material 4 after cutting.

3 and 4 show specific examples of the material supporting means 5. The material supporting means 5 is composed of a supporting plate 16 and a reinforcing plate 27 made of a steel plate and applied to the lower surface side thereof. Like the support plate 16, the reinforcing plate 27 has through holes 28 that are, for example, at the same pitch and that are slightly larger than the pitch.
Are uniformly formed, and are fixed between the support plate 16 and the frame 19 with, for example, an adhesive.

When the machining head 3 is repeatedly moved on the same locus, a thin and deep groove is gradually formed in the acrylic resin support plate 16, and the groove eventually penetrates the support plate 16. Become. Further, when the same locus is processed, the energy of the extra laser beam 2 after cutting the material to be cut 4 hits the upper surface of the reinforcing plate 27 and causes complicated diffuse reflection. The laser beam 2 after the reflection is again absorbed by the support plate 16 made of acrylic resin. When such a state is repeated for each cutting, a groove having a cutting shape as shown in FIG. 4 is formed in the support plate 16. The shape of the groove gradually expands to the lower side each time the cutting is performed, but the upper portion of the groove does not exceed the spot diameter of the laser beam 2.
Therefore, even if the supporting plate 16 is cut, the reinforcing plate 27 is not cut, so that the material supporting means 5 (the supporting plate 16 and the reinforcing plate 27) has a groove formed in the supporting plate 16 on the upper surface side thereof. , It will keep its original shape forever and fulfill the supporting function.

[Other Embodiments] In the above embodiment, the material supporting means 5 is of a movable type, but the material supporting means 5 can be used as a fixed table and also as a table type tray, so that its range of use is Is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiments.

Effects of the Invention According to the present invention, the following effects can be obtained.

(1) Since the material supporting means is composed of a supporting plate that absorbs a laser beam, the structure of the supporting means can be simplified and can be provided at low cost, which leads to cost reduction of the entire laser cutting device.

(2) Since the upper surface of the material support means is flat,
The material to be cut can be stably supported, and even if the combustion products at the time of cutting adhere to the upper surface thereof, they can be easily removed.

(3) Unlike a thin support part such as the conventional aluminum structure, because it is supported on almost the entire plane of the support plate,
The strength of the supporting portion is also high, and the conventional drawback of being easily deformed by an external force is eliminated.

(4) By providing the upper surface of the material support means with a support plate made of a material that absorbs a laser beam and a reinforcing plate made of a material that reflects the laser beam, a material support means with high durability can be obtained. In particular, even if the supporting plate is hollowed out by the laser beam, it is supported by the reinforcing plate therebelow and does not drop, so that the material supporting means is used for a long period of time.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a laser cutting device according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is an enlarged cross-sectional view of an essential part of the device, FIG. 3 is an enlarged cross-sectional view of a supporting means, and FIG. 4 shows a laser beam irradiation state. FIG. 1 ... Laser cutting device, 2 laser beam, 3 processing head, 4 cut material, 5 material support means, 6
· Machine stand, 10 · · Laser oscillator, 16 · · Acrylic resin support plate, 19 · · Steel plate frame, 20 · · Through hole, 27 · · Steel plate reinforcement plate, 28 · · Through hole.

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A laser cutting device for cutting a material to be cut into a desired shape by a relative movement movement of a processing head for irradiating a laser beam and a material supporting means for placing a material to be cut on the material. The means comprises a support plate that absorbs a laser beam and a reinforcing plate that is on the back side of the support plate and that reflects the laser beam. The supporting plate and the reinforcing plate have a large number of through holes. It is formed uniformly in the irradiation direction of the light beam, and further, a smoke collecting duct is provided below the supporting means in a state of communicating with the through hole, and the smoke collecting duct is connected to a suction blower. A laser cutting device. 2. A laser cutting device according to claim 1, wherein the laser beam is a carbon dioxide gas laser, and the supporting plate for absorbing the laser beam is an acrylic resin plate.