This study demonstrated a six-axis robot-assisted nanosecond laser texturing approach for fabricating high-aspect-ratio surface-tilted micro-structures to enhance direct metal–polymer joining. By precisely controlling the laser incidence angle and i...
This study demonstrated a six-axis robot-assisted nanosecond laser texturing approach for fabricating high-aspect-ratio surface-tilted micro-structures to enhance direct metal–polymer joining. By precisely controlling the laser incidence angle and inter-line pitch together with an overlap strategy for heat-affected zones, recast layer accumulation was promoted, allowing the formation of high-aspect-ratio micro-structures without thermal distortion of the metal plate. The spatial flexibility of the robot enabled reliable fabrication of inclined surface features, which increased both the effective joining area and mechanical interlocking capability. Adaptive control of the laser scanning path suppressed out-of-plane deformation during large-area processing, while point-to-point beam steering allowed the fabrication of geometrically diverse surface patterns such as groove lines, circular forms, and wobble structures. Tensile testing revealed that groove-line specimens showed direction-dependent reinforcement, with strength increasing up to 7.72× at 0° tilt and 13.41× at 8° tilt when the applied load was perpendicular to the grooves, whereas the interlocking effect was reduced under parallel loading. In contrast, wobble-structured specimens exhibited isotropic interlocking behavior, maintaining consistent strength regardless of the loading direction and achieving enhancements of 11.01× at 0° tilt and 14.11× at 8° tilt compared with the unstructured reference. These results confirm that robot-guided laser texturing enables scalable and precise fabrication of high-performance micro-structures and provides flexibility in designing their geometry and orientation for various applications. In particular, the wobble-formed structures, characterized by randomly distributed tilt orientations over 360 degrees, exhibited direction-independent anchoring, offering a scalable and adhesive-free method for integrating metal–polymer hybrids suitable for lightweight and high-strength components in automotive, aerospace, and related industries.