The energy absorbing behavior of stainless steel 304L during the pulsed Nd:YAG laser welding is investigated in this thesis. The equivalent absorptivity is estimated from the comparison of measured and finite element method (FEM) results simulated melting pool shape parameters, e.g. pool width, pool depth, cross-section area and total volume of the pool. To simulate the actual pulsed laser beam, the energy density of heating source is performed as a Guassian distribution in the transection of a circular laser beam. For evaluating the feasibility and the accuracy of the estimated equivalent absorptivity, the multi-pulsed Nd:YAG laser welding is simulated by using the estimated absorptivities. A good agreement between this simulated and measured melting pool shapes are found in the multi-pulsed laser welding. The equivalent absorptivity can be interpolated from different parameters of the molten pool. However, absorptivity curve fitted from the cross-section area and total volume of the melting pool provide a more stable value. Results also indicate that the absorptivity and the pulse energy are in inverse proportion. The thermal-elastic-plastic FEM model is employed to simulate the fusion and solidification process of the pulsed laser welding. A complicate residual stress distribution introduced from the shrinkage in the solidification process is also calculated and presented. The distribution of post-weld-deformation near the melting pool has also been studied in this thesis. This post-weld-deformation may be a key factor in high precision laser welding, e.g. laser packaging for the optoelectronic components. The absorptivity estimated in this thesis may be helpful to simulate the laser welding process accurately.

Welded structures susceptible to weld deformations require sequent processing to allow for mounting of precision components. This thesis includes a case study of the rear axle mount on a Volvo L220 wheel loader. A product development process was deployed in order to explore and evaluate alternative mounting methods such that manufacturing cost due to sequent processing could be decreased. Analysis of the frame variations showed any new concepts has to accommodate variations of up to $\delta z=-1.24\pm3.5$ mm. The product development process found two potential concept philosophies; transferring concepts which improves upon the current concept by transferring the processing away from the frame onto smaller components that are cheaper to process, and absorbing concepts that avoids sequent processing by absorbing the frame variations altogether. The transferring concept "Custom Plate" was selected for further development. The concept is based on the principals of reverse engineering by manufacturing a custom plate from a 3D surface map of the deformed mounting surface, placed between the frame and rear axle bridge, matching the surface geometry of both entities. The concept showed no apparent critical strength issues when simulated in CATIA V5. However, the economical gain of the concept is slim and depends heavily what spaces can be allocated for additional processing machinery. Suggestions for further development of the concept are given along with a discussion of improvements outside of the system boundary of the project, such as simulation of welds and welding sequence, and collection, storing, analysis, and visualisation of data.