Abstract
Since fine ceramics have excellent mechanical properties, they are used in a wide variety of structural parts. Laser machining of the fine ceramics is often accompanied by crack formation, which is produced by local thermal stress in the target due to a high temperature gradient. In this research, piercing in pulsed YAG laser irradiation was carried out for four kinds of normal sintered ceramics of size 3 mm in thickness. From the SEM observations of holes, the piercing process and the processing damage were investigated. The results obtained as follows. (1) The piercing time of oxide ceramics is less than non-oxide ceramics. Especially, the piercing of zirconia was carried out at 0.1 seconds or less. (2) For silicon carbide, the piercing time was long and the processing damage occurred easily.
