Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 May 27;16(6):634.
doi: 10.3390/mi16060634.

Experimental Study on Surface Polishing of SLM-316L Stainless Steel via Laser Treatment and Mechanical Grinding

Wei Fang  1   2 , Qiuling Wen  1   2 , Jiaxin Hu  1   2 , Feng Jiang  1   2 , Zhongwei Hu  1   2 , Xian Wu  3 , Jinlin Yang  1   2 , Xiaoguang Wang  1   2
Affiliations

Experimental Study on Surface Polishing of SLM-316L Stainless Steel via Laser Treatment and Mechanical Grinding

Wei Fang et al. Micromachines (Basel). .

Abstract

The 316L stainless steel material boasts exceptional corrosion resistance and plasticity, among other benefits, and finds extensive application in automotive components, molds, aerospace parts, biomedical equipment, and more. This work focuses on the surface polishing of selective laser melting (SLM) 316L stainless steel using 1064 nm nanosecond laser processing and mechanical grinding. The influence of laser processing parameters on the surface roughness of SLM-316L stainless steel was investigated using an orthogonal experiment. After laser processing, the surface roughness of SLM-316L stainless steel was reduced from 7.912 μm to 1.936 μm, but many randomly distributed irregular micro-cracks appeared on the surface. EDS and XRD detections illustrated that iron oxides were generated on the surface of SLM-316L stainless steel after laser processing. Mechanical grinding was further performed to achieve a nanometer surface finish and remove the metal oxides and micro-cracks generated on the surface of SLM-316L stainless steel after laser processing. The AFM measurement results indicate that the surface roughness of SLM-316L stainless steel was reduced to approximately 3 nm after mechanical grinding. Moreover, the micro-cracks and iron oxides on the surface of laser-processed SLM-316L stainless steel were completely removed. This work provides guidance for the precision polishing of SLM-316L stainless steel.

Keywords: SLM-316L stainless steel; mechanical grinding; nanosecond laser polishing; surface roughness.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(a) Optical photograph, (b) surface morphology, (c) EDS spectrum, and (d) XRD pattern of the original SLM-316L stainless steel.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic diagram of the laser processing experimental setup and illustration of the laser scanning strategy.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Surface morphologies of SLM-316L stainless steel after laser processing with different laser parameters: (a) No. 1, (b) No. 8, (c) No. 10, and (d) No. 13.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Surface micro-morphologies of (a–c) original and (d–f) laser-treated SLM-316L stainless steel.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Temperature field and thermal stress distribution of laser irradiation of SLM-316L stainless steel (a,b) with a defect and (c,d) without a defect at 140 μs.
Figure 6
Figure 6
EDS elemental analysis of SLM-316L stainless steel after laser processing.
Figure 7
Figure 7
XRD pattern of SLM-316L stainless steel after laser processing.
Figure 8
Figure 8
(a–c) Optical photographs and (d–f) AFM images of three SLM-316L stainless steel samples after mechanical grinding.
Figure 9
Figure 9
(a) SEM image and (b) XRD spectrum of SLM-316L stainless steel after mechanical grinding.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Liu Y., Li Z., Liu X.D., Zhang W., Gao C.F. Electropolishing of selective laser-melted 316L stainless steel. Electroplat. Finish. 2022;41:1634–1639. doi: 10.19289/j.1004-227x.2022.22.010. - DOI
    1. Kong Z., Wang X., Hu N., Jin Y., Tao Q., Xia W., Lin X.-M., Vasdravellis G. Mechanical properties of SLM 316L stainless steel plate before and after exposure to elevated temperature. Constr. Build. Mater. 2024;444:137786. doi: 10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2024.137786. - DOI
    1. Liverani E., Toschi S., Ceschini L., Fortunato A. Effect of selective laser melting (SLM) process parameters on microstructure and mechanical properties of 316L austenitic stainless steel. J. Mater. Process. Technol. 2017;249:255–263. doi: 10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2017.05.042. - DOI
    1. Suryawanshi J., Prashanth K.G., Ramamurty U. Mechanical behavior of selective laser melted 316L stainless steel. Mater. Sci. Eng. A. 2017;696:113–121. doi: 10.1016/j.msea.2017.04.058. - DOI
    1. Huang Y., Yang S., Gu J., Xiong Q., Duan C., Meng X., Fang Y. Microstructure and wear properties of selective laser melting 316L. Mater. Chem. Phys. 2020;254:123487. doi: 10.1016/j.matchemphys.2020.123487. - DOI

LinkOut - more resources