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Welding Glass To Metal Is Now Possible Using An Ultrafast Laser System, Researchers Report (phys.org)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Phys.Org: Scientists from Heriot-Watt University have welded glass and metal together using an ultrafast laser system, in a breakthrough for the manufacturing industry. Various optical materials such as quartz, borosilicate glass and even sapphire were all successfully welded to metals like aluminum, titanium and stainless steel using the Heriot-Watt laser system, which provides very short, picosecond pulses of infrared light in tracks along the materials to fuse them together. The new process could transform the manufacturing sector and have direct applications in the aerospace, defense, optical technology and even healthcare fields. Professor Duncan Hand, director of the five-university EPSRC Center for Innovative Manufacturing in Laser-based Production Processes based at Heriot-Watt, said: "Traditionally it has been very difficult to weld together dissimilar materials like glass and metal due to their different thermal properties -- the high temperatures and highly different thermal expansions involved cause the glass to shatter. Being able to weld glass and metals together will be a huge step forward in manufacturing and design flexibility."
He added: "The parts to be welded are placed in close contact, and the laser is focused through the optical material to provide a very small and highly intense spot at the interface between the two materials -- we achieved megawatt peak power over an area just a few microns across. This creates a microplasma, like a tiny ball of lightning, inside the material, surrounded by a highly-confined melt region. We tested the welds at -50C to 90C and the welds remained intact, so we know they are robust enough to cope with extreme conditions."
He added: "The parts to be welded are placed in close contact, and the laser is focused through the optical material to provide a very small and highly intense spot at the interface between the two materials -- we achieved megawatt peak power over an area just a few microns across. This creates a microplasma, like a tiny ball of lightning, inside the material, surrounded by a highly-confined melt region. We tested the welds at -50C to 90C and the welds remained intact, so we know they are robust enough to cope with extreme conditions."
And that will change after welding because ... ? In addition, metal and glass have different brittle vs. flexibility properties, so using them together seems like problematic use cases.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Now true minimalstic eyeglasses can be made, without frames screwed on sloppily.
N E other uses?
Get me some transparent aluminum, now!
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
or else it isn't and never was.
I'm not sure I'd consider 90 C to be "extreme conditions", considering boiling water is something one can expect to be able to be handled by either metal or glass, and therefore conditions one might expect a metal-glass weld to withstand.
Joining glass and metal like this has been kind of a "holy grail" for a lot of engineers and scientists, and is likely to enable the creation of some amazing stuff.
This technique is going to produce things that were previously impossible to manufacture; sensors, displays, and touch-sensitive controls, just to name a few. The process could end up being like the invention of the laser was- a solution looking for problems to solve.
When the first lasers became commercially available, a lot of engineers and designers had no idea what they might be good for (and rightfully so). Sure, lasers were cool, but what could you actually do with them?
It didn't take long to figure out the answer was "all sorts of cool shit". And laser LEDs took it to a new level; suddenly you could put an actual fucking laser in practically anything and it didn't require a lot of power. The future had arrived and it was full of lasers.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
been doing that for a long long long time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Why do I get the feeling that this will be used to make un-openable glass-backed smart phones?
You know, like all those Alcatel POS handsets with the glass front and back, that are not designed to be opened? Only instead of thermal-set glue, they will just freaking WELD the thing together at the factory, because it's cheaper?
This makes possible a whole new generation of right-to-repair abuses. What happens when a smartphone's glass front (and back?) can be permanently welded to the rest of the body, not using screws nor even adhesive? Can you imagine vehicles with windshields welded directly to the frame?
Dr Evil is waiting until someone manages to add sharks into the equation.
I suspect Apple will do some interesting design experiments with this process. If I were Cook Iâ(TM)d have some of my people at this lab already.
Maybe they've come up with a newer technique? Simple google finds this article
Direct welding of glass and metal by 1 kHz femtosecond laser pulses.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26560385
Full article is pay-walled but it seems work has been done by the Chinese State Key Laboratory of Transient Optics and Photonics, Xi’an Institute of Optics and Precision Mechanics of CAS, Xi’an 710119, China quite some time ago.
For the benefit of American readers, Heriot-Watt is in Edinborough. That's in Scotland.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Does this mean 3d printers are obsolete? We can hope.
I can remember when every other story here was about how they were going to usher in a new industrial revolution and all that shite.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The article itself.
Right to repair? Take it apart if you can! Mwah-h-h-a-a-a-h!!
or it didn't happen
Only a few short months until Apple invent it then.
This will be both a boon and a bane for the jewellery industry. Terrific new jewellery can be created but, once fused, difficult to take apart. A diamond won't be as easily transferable to a new ring without potential damage.
*** Don't be dull.***
If you want to know how the actual welds look like, here you go: https://www.lasersystemseurope...
Recently glued a 12" aluminum microwave door handle to the glass microwave door with JB Weld. No lasers required! Works great!
Aerogel is one of the best insulators on this globe. One of the issues with it is that it is relatively easy to decompose when moved around, bent, etc. Being in a sturdy frame makes a huge difference. With a metal frame, combined with glass locked in, it should be one of the best insulating windows on the planet.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Finally Apple and Microsoft can get rid of all that glue!
What the? How do you think that benefits American viewers? They largely can't remember their local geography, saying a place is in Scotland is about as helpful as saying it's 540km from Basque.
Seriously though, if you have an American friend who you correspond with who hasn't lived in the UK, ask them which of Britain and Scotland reaches further North, and which of Norway and Sweden, and which of Germany and Austria. Outside of war buffs, I have literally never heard an adult US citizen get all three right.
So users will never be able to replace the screen on their phones again. Will cost more to produce and buy and broken device will require complete replacement. Progress.
Off the top of my head, the bladerunner cars, the S1 TNG Enterprise shuttle (the really swoopy looking one they cut because of budget/reliability issues.), and a variety of other sci-fi vehicles and hardware from shows like Altered Carbon, Killjoys, The Expanse, The 100, etc.
The real question is if this production method scales, and if these 'few micro' welds can be scaled up to few inch welds for doing larger structures.
If they DO manage this on both wider welds and at manufacturing grade speeds, it could also make cars with integrated windows in order to reinforce the rigidity of the body. Now whether this can be done without compromising the safety glass, or using ceramics that won't shatter and kill the occupants is a matter left to the engineers.
One last idea: Riot shields made using transparent ceramics with a metal frame. If you thought riot cops/SWAT could get nasty now, imagine when their shields are bullet resistant and transparent.
Interesting research, but so far, the results are very prone to cracking and aren't very strong - a drip of superglue would perform much better!