P. von Witzendorff
A. Bordin
O. Suttmann
R. S. Patel
J. Bovatsek
L. Overmeyer

Laser ablation of borosilicate glass with high power shaped UV nanosecond laser pulses

SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9735: Laser Applications in Microelectronic and Optoelectronic Manufacturing (LAMOM) XXI
97350J
2016
Type: Zeitschriftenaufsatz (non-reviewed)
Abstract
The application of thin borosilicate glass as interposer material requires methods for separation and drilling of this material. Laser processing with short and ultra-short laser pulses have proven to enable high quality cuts by either direct ablation or internal glass modification and cleavage. A recently developed high power UV nanosecond laser source allows for pulse shaping of individual laser pulses. Thus, the pulse duration, pulse bursts and the repetition rate can be set individually at a maximum output power of up to 60 W. This opens a completely new process window, which could not be entered with conventional Q-switched pulsed laser sources. In this study, the novel pulsed UV laser system was used to study the laser ablation process on 400 μm thin borosilicate glass at different pulse durations ranging from 2 – 10 ns and a pulse burst with two 10 ns laser pulses with a separation of 10 ns. Single line scan experiments were performed to correlate the process parameters and the laser pulse shape with the ablation depth and cutting edge chipping. Increasing the pulse duration within the single pulse experiments from 2 ns to longer pulse durations led to a moderate increase in ablation depth and a significant increase in chipping. The highest material removal was achieved with the 2x10 ns pulse burst. Experimental data also suggest that chipping could be reduced, while maintaining a high ablation depth by selecting an adequate pulse overlap. We also demonstrate that real-time combination of different pulse patterns during drilling a thin borosilicate glass produced holes with low overall chipping at a high throughput rate.