| Femtosecond laser micromachining (FLM) offers advantages compared to other micromachining techniques such as minimum thermal damage to the surrounding material of machined area thus preventing microcracks, microdamage and material weakening for precise and quality machining. Hence, it has become an important micromachining tool for MEMS and BioMEMS applications. In this work, FLM is investigated for surface and subsurface micromachining on PMMA, an important biocompatible polymeric material. The process parameters of FLM are laser power, number of pulses per spot, pulse repetition rate, focal length of the lens used, and machining speed. These process parameters affect laser power loss, shift in focus, ablation, and eventually quality of machining. In this research work, sets of experiments are conducted with various combinations of the process parameters to analyze their effect on the machining quality on PMMA. |
