Laser welding has evolved over several decades and continues to expand into new applications, particularly with the rise of e-mobility. Recent developments focus on welding copper and aluminum, notably for busbars and battery housings. These materials are difficult to weld due to their high thermal conductivity, which leads to melt pool instabilities. While melt pool stabilization through beam shaping has been demonstrated and is now widely implemented in industry, several challenges still limit further progress. These include the need for complex fixtures due to low gap tolerance, limited processing speed caused by melt pool instability, and the formation of spatters and pores. Beam shaping offers promising solutions to address these limitations. For battery housing applications requiring aluminum, we investigate the impact of various beam shapes—including ring, ring-dot, triangle, and four-spot configurations—on laser welding performance across different materials and setups. Our work focuses primarily on Al 5xxx and Al 6xxx alloys. Parallel studies are being conducted with on copper, another key material in battery housing components for e-mobility.

In this presentation, we will also outline a strategy for identifying optimal beam shapes using multiphysics simulations. The workflow includes model validation, parameter variation to assess their influence on key weld characteristics, and shape optimization based on performance metrics. We also consider constraints related to the manufacturability of beam shapes. Criteria for evaluating weld performance will be discussed, along with insights into current discrepancies between simulation results—which can be seen as virtual experimentation—and practical outcomes from welding real parts.