Laser Cutting Systems: CUTLITE PENTA
CO2 Laser Cutting, a sinthesis of power and precision
Cutlite Penta designs, manufactures and markets the most advanced laser cutting systems and despite only having been set up in 1992, it has already become a leader in Italy in the field of CO2 laser cutting devices. CutLite combines El. En.'s experience with that historical of Valfivre spa, and in this way it has built up a wealth of human resources and technological experience. Its commitment and expertise have been rewarded with a remarkable and ever-growing commercial success all over the world. Just like the entire EL.EN Group, CUTLITE PENTA is capable of offering high technology and the tops in quality.
Visit CUTLITE PENTA Home Page >>>
Applications for Laser Cutting
An economic advantage: Laser cutting is an advantageous technology choice. A careful evaluation of the features of the most suitable cutting system guarantees optimum results in the following aspects:
reduction of total work times;
increase in production quality.
The technological advantage
Laser cutting is, above all, precise, clean and silent.
The beam can be focalized on an extremely small area (from 0.1 to 1mm in diameter).
The area in proximity to the cut edge has a very low heat alteration. Moreover, the laser cut has the capacity of operating on complex profiles and with very small rays of curvature.
Unlike water and traditional cutting systems, light exerts no mechanical pressure on the piece.
The laser is a non-contact instrument that guarantees:
total absence of mechanical pressure on the piece;
absence of wear in the instrument;
cutting capability independent of hardness of the material; capability of cutting coated or surface treated materials.
Laser cutting also has a high degree of automation and flexibility able to offer:
ease of integration with other automated systems;
very high trimming capability;
capability of adapting immediately to changes in production requirements.
In many cases, laser cutting can produce finished pieces that do not require further processing (polishing, de-burring, finishing etc.).
CUTLITE PENTA Official Website >>>
Plastic Cutting with Laser
Laser has found a wide range of uses in the field of plastic materials, above all thanks to its capacity to cut complex shapes at high speeds with the absence of stress and deformation of the items. It also allows for clean cutting of thermoplastic materials with shiny edges. Good performances are also obtained with polyesters and polycarbonates even though at times for certain polymers there is a slight layer of carbon elements along the cutting edge. With the Cutlite Penta devices, special features exalt the quality of the finish of the items, even when cutting considerable thicknesses. By paying particular attention to the reduction of vapours it is also possible to cut various types of compound materials with excellent results thanks to the precision and extremely small focussing area of the laser beam. Kevlar, multiplayer materials in carbon fibre and various compounds pre-impregnated prior to the polymerisation can also be cut using special techniques at extremely high speeds. Natural and synthetic rubber with thicknesses of up to 20 mm can also be cut with medium intensity CO2 laser.
Wood Cutting
Woodcutting is an excellent application for the high precision of the cut of Cutlite Penta machines. In particular, for dye cutting, the Cutlite Penta cutting systems produce exact and uniform grooves along the entire length of the worked surface. In addition to marking and cutting of inlay pieces, there are many applications in handicrafts, gift items and interior furnishings. Paper materials can be cut easily with a low-power laser.
Cutting Metals with Laser
Most metals possess good characteristics for cutting.
Because of the great possibilities of focalization, reaching specific powers of a million Watts per cm2, the incident laser beam causes superficial fusion and, therefore, triggers the cutting process in nearly all metals, in spite of the high levels of surface reflectivity.
Conventional steel
Conventional steel types have a considerably reduced (or practically nonexistent) heat altered zone (HAZ) compared to plasma cutting systems. Cold rolled steels give better results than hot rolled ones. High carbon content steels are cut more easily, even though they have a greater heat altered zone than conventional steels.
Carbon steel
It is now known that in the metal structural work industry laser cutting of the sheets prevails. Compared to plasma cutting, laser cutting is more accurate for thickness up to 15-20 mm. The cut edges are clean, squared and free of burrs. The cut grooves (kerfs) have a width of less than one-twentieth of the thickness, providing greater accuracy in assembly of the pieces with minimal tolerance.
Stainless steel
The laser is applied with excellent results in the cutting of components from stainless steel sheets. The high degree of accuracy and heat control prohibit extent of the heat altered zone from the cutting groove, allowing the material to maintain its characteristics of stainlessness and resistance to corrosion. Even martensite and ferrite steels?? are easily cut at different speeds. As in the case of stainless steels, steel alloys present ideal conditions for cutting and working with the laser. Though they possess high thermal conductivity and limited laser radiation absorption, aluminum alloys and brass can be worked with powers starting at 1000 Watts. Thickness of up to 44 millimeters can be cut.
Copper
alloys (with the exception of brass) have poor laser beam absorption. Use of the laser with these metals is possible, but, at times, with levels of difficulty that are not industrially acceptable.
Titanium
This can be cut easily and quickly with excellent finishing quality with a beam generated by a CO2 source. If oxygen is used as booster gas, a greater cutting speed is produced, creating a thin deposit of titanium oxide in proximity of the groove.
Browse CUTLITE PENTA - Laser Cutting >>>
Laser Welding, Drilling, Soldering
Laser Welding
Welding is a heat process in which the energy supplied serves for fusing the parts of the two components to be joined together. The different welding methods vary first of all due to the way in which the energy is supplied to the items: with laser welding the energy for fusion is supplied in the form of electromagnetic energy, in particular in the form of infrared light.
There are numerous advantages to be gained from laser welding: Elevated precision and high execution speeds Autogenous welding that does not require any additional materials Low running costs In-depth welding and consequently one-stroke solutions Limited heat content, almost total absence of deformations or heat alterations Great stability and reproducibility of the process, making it particularly suitable for automation CO2 Laser CO2 is efficacious on the following metals: Iron and ferrous materials Steel Aluminium Titanium The thicknesses range from a few tenths of a millimetre up to 6 - 8 mm.
Die-boards
For over twenty years now laser has been the most important instrument for the production of dies:
- in wood, flat and rotational for paper-working
- in acrylic for labelling companies.
Modern-day market demands and the high productivity of the die-cutting systems call for quality standards of the highest possible level, that can only be achieved with automated equipment, and in particular, with laser cutting systems. The geometric precision of the multiple-yield dies requested today on the market can only be guaranteed by systems with numeric control, and in particular, by laser cutting systems. For this purpose Cutlite Penta proposes laser systems that are specifically designed for cutting flat and rotational dies. The excellent laser emission features of the sources used together with the specialisation of the system guarantee excellent productivity and constant quality.
Specific laser systems designed to cut the rotational dies take two essential aspects into consideration:
" the rapidity of "loading and unloading" the wooden shells;
" the capacity of the system to overcome the intrinsic limits of the wooden shells themselves.
In fact, given the natural "inconstancy" characteristics of the wood, the shells are not able to guarantee the necessary dimensional accuracy. A rotational system must consequently be fitted with accessories and equipment capable of redirecting the shells onto the theoretical diameter during the processing. Cutlite Penta has tackled this problem by proposing two different solutions that have given rise to two types of rotational systems:
OFR which is the simplest and most economic system, guaranteeing excellent value-for-money;
OFR-X 3000 that represents the synthesis of our company's experience in the rotational die sector, dedicated above all to die-cutters requiring elevated productivity and absolute quality.
CUTLITE PENTA - Laser Welding >>>
CUTLITE Products
OM Laser Cutting System
Designed to optimise cutting on large surface areas
Designed to optimise cutting on large surface areas, the OM 3020 laser systems have been created to provide users with the numerous advantages deriving from the use of entire sheets of acrylic
• possibility of optimising the use of materials on large surface areas
• possibility of operating without any size limits
• the achieving of relatively long work cycles, in order to be able to make the operator’s free time productive between loading and unloading operations.
The great versatility of this system is demonstrated by the possibility of implementing it with metal-cutting accessories. In this configuration with powers of 1000/2000W, the OM 3020 system becomes extremely competitive, especially for companies in the sign-writing and poster sectors that usually have to complete the cutting of plastic materials with the on-site production of metal structural assembly accessories.
OM 3020 3AX 500W Cat.
A configuration that combines top quality results with flexibility of use, without lengthy, time-consuming operations for learning the processing cycle, and with time-savings and machines always available for active processing. In fact the cutting programme is managed on the CAD-CAM like a normal sheet-cutting operation and our own powerful "LCX" software, created onsite, calculates tangencies, work offsets and cutting definitions.
In this configuration the OM system makes profiling, perforating on vertical planes, and head-processing of thermoforms as easy as 2-D cutting.
Visit CUTLITE PENTA Products Catalog >>>