Patent ID: 6864460

Claim:
An apparatus for ablating a hole through a hard, nonmetallic workpiece comprising: a first laser assembly having a first galvanometer and a second laser assembly having a second galvanometer; said first laser assembly having a first optical lens for focusing a first laser beam emitted from said first laser assembly and said second laser assembly having a second optical lens for focusing a second laser beam emitted from said second laser assembly coincident with said first laser beam; and a controller first focusing said first and second laser beams on opposed surfaces of said hard, non-metallic workpiece to ablate first layers of said hard metallic workpiece at said opposed surfaces, said controller then refocusing said first and second laser beams in a Z axis to ablate second layers of said hard metallic workpiece adjacent said first layers, and said controller continuing to refocus said laser beams to ablate successive layers of said hard metallic workpiece in said Z axis, thereby forming said hole through said hard, non-metallic workpiece.