Investigation of the forming pressure and formability of metal foil by laser-driven multi-layered flyer

• A multi-layered flyer is applied in the laser-driven flyer micro-forming.
• The multi-layered flyer generates higher forming pressure than the single-layered flyer does.
• Good forming formability of metal foil is obtained by using the multi-layered flyer.
• The nonmetallic impactor layer can generate good forming quality.

Metal foil forming by laser-driven flyer (LDF) is a new micro-forming technology. The performance of the flyer is one of the main factors affecting the forming quality of workpiece. Considering the features of this technology, this paper presents a novel multi-layered flyer. Via magnetron sputtering, the absorption layer (titanium) and the ablation layer (aluminum) are produced on the confining medium. The impactor layer is manufactured by special cutting (a micro-punching method) and adhered to the center of the ablation layer by a gluing method. A pressure measurement system is conducted to measure the shockwave forming pressure of the laser-driven flyer, and a series of forming experiments are carried out to investigate the forming ability of the multi-layered flyer. Experimental results show that the multi-layered flyer can enhance the laser coupling efficiency to the flyer and achieve higher forming pressure than the single-layered flyer. Especially, the multi-layered flyer with the nonmetallic impactor layer of 100 µm polyurethane rubber has good forming quality in the laser-driven flyer micro-forming (LDFµF).