Copper has excellent thermal and electrical conductivity and offers a wide range of possibilities for industrial application due to the versatility of various alloying strategies. Especially, there is a need for copper in electromobility applications. It may be used as a carrier material in the battery, in the engine, in the converter and for the charging technology. Connectors made of copper alloys play a particularly important role in so-called high-power charging (HPC) with charging capacities of up to 350 kW, since enormous amounts of heat are generated during the charging process. However, the rise in temperature reduces the charging capacity. By using Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF), internal cooling channels can be easily integrated. In this way, an optimal cooling effect and thus also an optimal charging process can be made possible.
In this context, the precipitation-hardenable alloy CuCr1Zr plays an important role as its properties favor it as alloy for HCP chargers. Additive manufacturing of CuCr1Zr enables new fields of application due to a higher degree of freedom and an individual materials design. However, LPBF of CuCr1Zr is complicated due the low absorption of copper with respect to laser radiation as well as of the high thermal conductivity of copper. An optimization of the process condition might be reached by using a green laser with a wavelength of 532 nm, instead of a red laser with a wavelength of 1064 nm. The presented study focusses on LPBF with a red and green laser system, the process parameter definition by a DoE approach and the microstructure investigations. The micro- and nanostructure formation in relation to the Cr concentration of the alloy is highlighted, revealing the occurrence of zirconium oxides. Furthermore, parameters like the electric conductivity, mechanical properties and the crimping ability are regarded. Finally, the transfer from test specimens to a HPC charger with internal cooling channel is demonstrated.