Laser-induced vibration during pulsed laser forming

In this study, the vibration phenomenon during pulsed laser forming of thin metal plates was investigated numerically and experimentally. The metal plates were made of 304 stainless steel and were heated by a CO₂ Gaussian laser beam with a long pulse duration of 0.1 s, which incited vibration due to the elastic-plastic deformation of the specimen. This uncoupled thermal-mechanical problem was solved using a three-dimensional finite element method and was subsequently satisfactorily verified with experiments. Using the superposition method with multiple laser pulses, the non-linear vibration phenomenon during pulsed laser forming has also been observed experimentally for thin plates.