UNIVERSITI TUN HUSSEIN ONN MALAYSIA

Beg Berkunci 101 86400 Parit Raja, Batu Pahat Johor Darul Takzim

THE FACULTY OF MECHANICAL & MANUFACTURING ENGINEERING

BDD 4063 CASTING PROCESS PROBLEM BASED LEARNING
NAME NOR HASBULLAH BIN IBRAHIM TUAN MOHD HAFEEZ BIN TUAN IBRAHIM PUAN HUEY KIM ELIZACORINA SIGURU AZZA BIN AB RAHAMAN MUHAMAD FUAD BIN ABDUL HALIM MUHAMAD RIDZUAN BIN MD DIN MATRIC NO. CD090049 CD090047 AD080344 AD080301 CD090082 CD090085 CD090359

LECTURER SECTION

: DR. ROSLI BIN AHMAD : 6

Title Of Problem: The Cast-Oil Field Fitting

A common problem in casting process is concerning to defect failure. The initial investigation found that the defect occurrence depends on type of material, casting process used, geometry of the die, fluid flow and heat transfer of the molten metal. Apart from the hazardous situation when dealing with hot temperature of molten metal as show in Figure 1, some defects such as gas bubbles, penetration and enlargement also occur in the cast component.

A cast iron, T-type fitting is being produced for the oil drilling industry, using a no bakes sand for the both mold and the core. Silica sand has been used in combination with a binder. Figure 2 shows a cross section of the mold with the core in place (part a), and a cross section of the finished casting (part b). The final casting contains several significant defects. Gas bubbles are observed in the bottom section of the horizontal tee. A penetration defect is observed near the bottom of the inside diameter, and there is an enlargement of the casting at location C. Your company has been handed a special task to investigate the

typical defects failure. As a project leader of engineer, you required to write a technical report on casting defects occurred and suggestions on how to obtain a casting product free of defect.

Problem to be solved. 1. What is the most likely source of the gas bubbles and why are they present only at the location noted? 2. What factors may have caused the penetration defect and why is the defect near the bottom of the casting, but not near the top? 3. What factors led to the enlargement of the casting at Point C and what would you recommend to correct this problem? 4. Could these molds and cores be reclaimed (recycled) after breakout?

Solution. 1.

Bubbles

Gas porosity is the formation of bubbles within the casting after it has cooled. This occurs because most liquid materials can hold a large amount of dissolved gas, but the solid form of the same material cannot, so the gas forms bubbles within the material as it cools. Gas porosity may present itself on the surface of the casting as porosity or the pore may be trapped inside the metal, which reduces strength in that vicinity. Nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen are the most encountered gases in cases of gas porosity.

For this case, the binder for the no-bake sand is a polymerizable alkyd-oil/urethane material. Gases can be evolved from the binder when it is heated and the polymer material begins to depolymerize. In fact, there are two possibilities for gas problems with this material. If the binder had been completely polymerized during the manufacture of the core, the high temperature of the cast iron could break down the binder into small fragments having low molecular weight and low boiling point, thus producing the bubbles. In addition, this particular type of binder has a long curing time --12 to 24 hours are required for the polymerization to complete at room temperature. If the core or the mold were not completely cured, there would already be low molecular weight, low boiling point, constituents present that could form gases as soon as the liquid iron entered the mold cavity.

The gases are located near a surface, just beneath the core. It appears that the gas bubbles formed, started to float, and were trapped by the core. Vents could be added to the core and/or mold to give the gases an easier path to escape through the sand, rather than becoming trapped in the liquid metal. In addition, we want to make sure

that the binder is completely cured prior to pouring. Coarser grained sand with a narrow distribution of sand grain sizes will provide higher permeability and permit easier gas removal. Finally, a switch to a different type of binder could reduce the amount of gas produced from that of the oil/urethane.

In addition, the gas bubble is most likely formed during pouring and filling due to the interaction of molten metal and the surrounding air. Within Liquid metals have a significant amount of dissolved gasses. When these metals solidify they sometimes cannot accommodate the gases, and gas bubbles are formed. The gas bubbles present in the figure is due to these processes and also due to the location; the flow at the location is most likely a turbulent flow. The solution to this problem is solved by using a melting process under vacuum conditions, and under protective flux that excludes contact with the air. Controlling the flow of molten metal to minimize turbulence, and gas flushing; the passing of reactive gases through the metal.

2.
Penetration

When molten metal enters the gaps between the sand grains, the result would be a rough casting surface. This is due to either use of coarse sand grains in mould material or no use of mould wash. The fluidity also has to do with penetration. High fluidity causes erosion of the gating system and the metal to fill the mold cavity, also any small voids between the particles of a (sand) mold. This causes the surface to have small particles of embedded sand or foreign particles.

This can also be caused by higher pouring temperature. Because of high temperatures metal-mold reactions are accelerated; this metal mold reaction causes defects, due to the changed chemical compositions of the metal-mold surfaces. The

defects are on the inside of the casting because thats where the metal flow occurs and also where the highest temperature is present. Choosing appropriate grain sizes, together with proper mould wash should be able to eliminate this defect.

Penetration near bottom

For this case, Penetration occurred by liquid metal flowing between the sand grains of the core. It appears that the core was not properly compacted, with relatively large voids between the sand grains. The core may have also had very large sand grains with a very narrow distribution of sizes (although this is contrary to the conclusion of question 1. The core also gets hotter than the mold, since the core is completely surrounded by liquid metal. In addition, the region showing the penetration is adjacent to the gate where it will have received the molten metal first and would have been hotter longer than the remainder of the mold. The long exposure to high heat may have led to the breakdown of the binder and helped the liquid metal penetrate the sand. Finally, the defect was only noted near the bottom of the casting because of the higher metallostatic pressure head (the pressure of the column of molten metal) helping to force the metal between the sand grains.

3. An enlargement or bulging of the casting surface resulting from liquid metal pressure is also known as swell defect. It occurs due to poor ramming of the mould or not properly reinforcing deep moulds.

Enlargement Casting Defect

The enlargement could have occurred because the mold was weak and the high metallostatic pressure crushed the sand, thus enlarging the mold cavity. Better compaction during mold making would produce denser, and stronger, sand. Using a larger amount of binder might also help, but gas problems would tend to become more severe. Another possible cause would be erosion, because the enlargement occurred next to the gate where all of the liquid metal entered the mold cavity. The sand near the gate becomes the hottest, and the binder may have decomposed prematurely. Swells can be avoided by proper ramming of the sand and providing adequate support to the mould and also by using of several gates, rather than just one. 4. Both the molds and the cores could be reclaimed. The binders are organic, and, with luck, most of the organic material will have broken down during the casting and cooling process. If the organic breakdown is not sufficient, some form of reclamation process can be used. A mechanical reclamation system would perhaps fire the sand grains at a hard metal plate, where the impact would break the brittle polymer binder of f of the sand grain surface. A thermal reclamation system, in which the sand is heated to a high temperature (usually above 1000F), will burn off any residual binder. The processed sand is then carefully screened to assure the proper size and distribution of sizes prior to rebounding and reuse.