Surface texturing of stainless steel engraved by laser etching

This study examined surface texture engraved by laser irradiation in sulfuric acid solution. The Laser irradiation accelerates local corrosion in acid solution, and forms groove pattern. This process is called (cid:672) Laser etching (cid:673) . It shall be noted that the simple application of laser etching can merely create an entire surface corrosion. By applying passive potential, the groove depth of corrosion by laser irradiation be-came deeper than natural potential and area which was not irradiated by laser did not corrode. The groove depth of corrosion increased with increasing laser power and increasing scanning number of laser irradiation in 100 and 200 µm beam diameter. The groove width of corrosion decreased with increasing scanning speed of laser beam. Under the same laser power, groove width of corrosion by laser irradiation was approximately constant, but groove width of corrosion by laser in 100 µm beam diameter was smaller than 200 µm beam diameter under optimum laser power condition. From these results, tapered groove and multi grooves of corrosion can be formed by laser etching.