828
J. Mater. Sci. Technol., Vol.23 No.6, 2007
Density and Mechanical Properties of Aluminum Lost Foam Casting
by Pressurization during Solidification
Bokhyun KANG1) , Yongsun KIM1) , Kiyoung KIM1) , Gueserb CHO2) , Kyeonghwan CHOE2)
and Kyongwhoan LEE2)
1) Department of Materials Engineering, Korea University of Technology and Education, 307 Gajeon-ri, Byungchunmyon, Cheonan, Choongnam, 330-708, Korea
2) Advanced Materials Processing Team, Korea Institute of Industrial Technology, 994 Dongchun-dong, Yunsoo-ku,
Incheon, 406-130, Korea
[Manuscript received February 10, 2007, in revised form May 11, 2007]
Porosity is thought to be severe in aluminum alloy castings produced by lost foam process due to the pyrolysis
of the polystyrene foam pattern during pouring, which results in detrimental effect in mechanical property.
The slow solidification rate promotes the formation of gassing pin holes, and relative weakness of the thermal
gradients can cause micro-shrinkage if the outline of the part complicates feeding in the lost foam casting. One
of the methods to eliminate the porosity is to apply high pressure to the molten metal like an isostatic forging
during solidification. Fundamental experiments were carried out to evaluate the effect of the external pressure
on the porosity and mechanical properties of A356.2 alloy bar in the lost foam casting. Solidification time and
porosity decreased with increasing the applied pressure during solidification. Applying external pressure was
effective in decreasing the porosity and increasing the elongation of the lost foam casting.
KEY WORDS: Lost foam casting; Porosity; Pressurization; Elongation
1. Introduction
Aluminum alloy castings are widely used in the
automobile and aerospace industries, and are replacing heavier forged steel or cast iron for the lighter
and more fuel-efficient automobiles. Producing defect
free Al castings becomes more important. Lost foam
casting process is gaining confidence among manufacturers, and has many advantages like eliminating machining steps, making complex casting without cores
and reducing environmental loads, because molding
binder is not added into the mold of the lost foam
process.
Porosity is thought to be severe in Al alloy castings produced by lost foam process due to the pyrolysis of the polystyrene foam pattern during pouring, which results in detrimental effect in mechanical
property[1] . It can also lead to a lack of pressure tightness. Internal pores are caused by the liquid polymer
trapped within the liquid metal. The metal solidifies before the liquid polystyrene foam escapes to the
metal-coating interface. As the pyrolysis of the liquid
polystyrene foam continues, a bubble of gaseous decomposition product is trapped in the partly frozen
casting[2] . The slow solidification rate promotes the
formation of pin holes, and relative weakness of the
thermal gradients can cause micro-shrinkage if the
outline of the part complicates feeding in the lost foam
casting.
The porosity in the lost foam casting is higher
than that in conventional CO2 mold casting. The
contribution of the gas resulted from the pyrolysis of
the polystyrene foam pattern could be estimated by
comparing the density of the conventional CO2 mold
casting with that of the lost foam casting. It suggests that it is difficult to obtain better mechanical
Prof., to whom correspondence should be addressed,
E-mail:
[email protected].
properties in the lost foam casting without a special
treatment than in the conventional casting[3] . Although porosity can be minimized by proper process
design or control, it is sometimes necessary or cost
effective to fill voids by using an impregnation process in postcasting operations[4] . One of the methods
to eliminate the porosity during the casting operation is to apply high pressure like isostatic forging[5] .
When the pattern has been destroyed completely by
the metal after having filled the mold with the molten
metal, an isostatic gas pressure is exerted on the assembly of mold and metal, preferably before the metal
begins solidifying. Rapid solidification can also be expected under controlled pressure due to the enhancement in contact between the casting and the sand.
By applying pressure to the molten metal during solidification, the molten metal front is more stable and
fewer casting defect arise.
It is recognized that the application of external
pressure to the molten metal before the complete solidification of the metal can aid the interdendritic
feeding of the casting and prevent both the precipitation of hydrogen porosity and the formation of microporosity.
Fundamental experiments were carried out to evaluate the effect of applied pressure on the porosity and
mechanical properties of A356.2 alloy bar in the lost
foam casting.
2. Experimental
A schematic of the pressure vessel for the lost foam
casting is illustrated in Fig.1. Diameter and height
of the vessel are 260 mm and 500 mm, respectively,
and it was designed to endure under the pressure of
1.77 MPa at maximum, and made of stainless steel.
Compressed air was introduced through the inlet of
the vessel lid. A pressure gauge and safety valve were
installed on the vessel lid, too.
J. Mater. Sci. Technol., Vol.23 No.6, 2007
829
pressure gauge attached in the vessel and installed in
the sand was recorded, which makes pores small and
finely dispersed during solidification. Figure 3 is a
measured example of cooling curve and variation of
pressure difference with time. It is seen that pressure
difference of 10.715.1 kPa exists before solidification
of the cast bar finishes.
Three chromel/alumel thermocouples of 0.2 mm
in diameter were used to measure temperatures of the
casting. Cast bars were sectioned for density measurement after cooling. Density of the sample was determined by using the conventional Archimedes principle. Area of the pore was measured by the image analyzer. Tensile test was also performed under the strain
rate of 0.01/s. Microstructure was observed with OM
(optical microscopy) and SEM (scanning electron microscopy) .
Fig.1 Schematic of pressure vessel
The pattern was prepared by a hot wire cutter
from an EPS (expandable polystyrene) block. Pattern was dipped into a commercial refractory coating
for lost foam pattern and then dried at room temperature for over 24 h. Pattern was put on the base of the
flask, and the flask was filled with mold packing sand
in vibration with a frequency of 60 Hz. Molten aluminum was poured into EPS pattern, and the lid on
the pressure vessel was closed within 30 s. Then a controlled external compressed air pressure was applied
to the molten metal in the flask. Diameter and height
of the cylindrical flask are 110 mm and 250 mm, respectively. The density of EPS foam is 25 kg/m3 , and
the size of the cast bar is 25 mm25 mm120 mm.
To investigate the influence of mold packing sand,
three kinds of silica sand were chosen, with AFS fineness numbers of 38, 69 and 74 (denoted as sand A,
B, C, respectively). The shapes of sands used in
this experiment are shown in Fig.2. Sand A and
C seem to be sub-angular, whereas sand B seems
to be near angular and size distribution of sand B
is wider than that of sand A and sand C.
Experiments were conducted using A356.2 (Al7%Si-0.35Mg-low Fe) aluminum alloy ingot, which is
widely used in the automobile industries. A charge of
3 kg was melted in a graphite crucible using electric
resistance furnace, and then poured into the mold at
710 C.
Pressure in the sand was measured with the
transmitters composed of piezoresistive resistor and
Wheatstone bridge. Pressure difference between the
3. Results and Discussion
3.1 Density and porosity of the cast bar
Figure 4 shows the variation of density with applied pressure for three mold packing sands. Density
of the cast bar increases gradually by applying external pressure, and reaches a rather constant level over
490 kPa irrespective of the mold packing sand. The
effect of applied external pressure on the density is
the largest for the coarse sand A and is the smallest for the sand B because the opening between the
sand grains is the largest in the sand A, and the
smallest for the angular shaped sand B. The rate
of formation of polymer degradation products seems
to be almost the same for three mold packing sands.
The escape path of the gas evolved during pouring
seems to be more important to remove the porosity[6]
and to be affected by the size of the opening between
sand grains. The apparent densities of the compacted
bed with silica sand A, sand B and sand C
were 1.63103 , 1.85103 , 1.69103 kg/m3 , respectively. The escape path in sand A was wider than
in the other packing sands. It is thought that the effect of the escape path was not significant under no
pressure, however it was obviously significant by pressurization.
Figure 5 shows the transverse sections of cast bars
using sand A with applied pressure. Many pores
are seen in the specimen cast under no pressure, however the decrease in the number and size of the pore
with increasing the applied pressure is obvious. Pore
is almost free for the specimen cast under the pressure
of 1.47 MPa.
Fig.2 Shapes of mold packing materials: (a) sand A, (b) sand B, (c) sand C
830
J. Mater. Sci. Technol., Vol.23 No.6, 2007
Fig.3 Cooling curve and variation of pressure difference
with time
Fig.4 Density of specimen with applied pressure
Fig.5 Transverse sections with applied pressure for sand A: (a) 0 kPa, (b) 490 kPa, (c) 980 kPa, (d) 1470 kPa
is thought to be mainly due to the difference of the
pore shape.
Porosity decreases with increasing the applied
pressure and it is lowest for sand A specimen under
the same applied pressure.
Fig.6 Variation of porosity and density with applied
pressure and mold packing material
Figure 6 shows the variation of porosity and density with applied pressure and mold packing sand.
Porosity is proportional inversely to the density, and a
little gap is seen between the measured porosity and
the calculated one. Measured porosity was derived
from the result based on the area of the pore measured
by the image analyzer and Saltykov0 s method[7] , while
calculated porosity was obtained from the following
formula. Calculated porosity=(theoretical density
measured density)/theoretical density 100%. Theoretical density of 2.69103 kg/m3 for A356.2 alloy was
chosen. Saltykov0 s method is to determine spatial size
distribution from two-dimensional measurements, and
the analysis is based on the assumption that the pores
have spherical shapes. Because the shape of pores in
this experiment is not really spherical, the gap between the measured porosity and the calculated one
3.2 Mechanical properties
Figure 7 shows the variation in the hardness of
the sample with applied pressure. Hardness increases
steeply up to the pressure of 490 kPa and then increases slightly with the further increase in pressure.
This is opposite to the tendency for the porosity.
Hardness of the specimen cast under no pressure is
about HB 3640, while those of pressurized specimens
are HB 4549. Hardness also increased about 50%
from HB 5260 to 6270 after T6 heat treatment (solution heat treated at 520 C and then aged at 160 C).
It is apparent from the above that increasing the applied pressure to the specimen leads to an increase in
the hardness and decrease in the porosity.
Figure 8 shows the tensile strength and elongation of the sample with applied pressure after T6 heat
treatment. Tensile strength increased from 150 MPa
to about 200 MPa and elongation from 3% to 11%
by applying pressure. Increase in elongation is much
larger than that in tensile strength. Mechanical properties of the Al casting, particularly fatigue property
are greatly affected by the porosity[8] . It is known
that elongation is also greatly affected by the porosity from Figs.8 and 9.
Figure 9 shows the effect of applied pressure on the
elongation and porosity. Porosity decreases rapidly
and elongation increases near linearly with increasing
applied pressure. It can be realized that the elongation would be over 10% with the applied pressure over
980 kPa.
J. Mater. Sci. Technol., Vol.23 No.6, 2007
831
Fig.9 Effect of the applied pressure on the elongation
and porosity
Fig.7 Hardness of specimen with applied pressure:
(a) as cast, (b) T6 treated
Fig.10 DAS with applied pressure
Fig.8 Tensile strength and elongation of specimen with
applied pressure
3.3 Microstructure
Figure 10 shows the variation in the secondly
dendrite arm spacing (DAS) with applied pressure.
DAS decreases approximately 15% with
the increase in applied pressure. It can be confirmed
from the microstructures with applied pressure for
sand A, as shown in Fig.11. Decrease in DAS can
be explained in term of the solidification time. Cooling curves of the cast bars with applied pressure are
shown in Fig.12. Solidification time of the specimen
cast under no pressure is about 200 s, while that
under the pressure of 1470 kPa is 135 s. Solidification time decreases considerably with increasing applied pressure approximately 30%. Applied pressure
of 1470 kPa produced a significant reduction in the solidification time. As the applied external pressure increases during solidification, microstructures become
finer due to the fast solidification.
The fractured surfaces of tensile specimens showed
the characteristics of brittle fracture indicating a general lack of ductility or that of ductile fracture at
a glance after tensile test. The fractured surfaces
of cast bars observed by SEM after tensile test are
shown in Fig.13. Low porosity specimen shows a
typical dimple pattern in the ductile fracture surface, while high porosity one shows a brittle fracture surface which is associated with shrinkage cavities and pores. Dimples which are affected by the
size and distribution of the microstructure discontinuities such as pores, dispersed particles and microcracks are rounded and elongated hollows in Fig.13(a).
Secondary arms of dendrite at the end of the solidification are seen clearly in Fig.13(b). Regions of shrinkage
porosity contain dendrite lobes, which existed as free
surfaces within the cavities after solidification. The
presence of shrinkage cavities and pores in the specimen cast under no pressure leads to the fast failure
832
J. Mater. Sci. Technol., Vol.23 No.6, 2007
Fig.11 Microstructures with applied pressure for sand A: (a) 0 kPa, (b) 490 kPa, (c) 980 kPa, (d) 1470 kPa
structed by the gas pressure evolved by the pyrolysis
of pattern materials.
4. Conclusions
Fig.12 Cooling curves with applied pressure
(1) The density of the cast bars increased gradually with the applied external pressure and reached a
rather constant level over 490 kPa irrespective of the
mold packing sand.
(2) Applying the external pressure to the molten
metal during solidification was effective in decreasing
the porosity and increasing the mechanical properties of the lost foam casting. Elongation increased
markedly of them.
(3) Solidification time decreased with increasing
the applied pressure during solidification, which resulted in finer secondary dendrite arm spacing.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported financially by Cleaner Production Technology Development Scheme of Korean Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy, Korea.
REFERENCES
Fig.13 SEM images of fractured surface after tensile test:
(a) low porosity and high elongation, (b) high
porosity and low elongation
and low elongation. The cavities could have been
mainly caused by the pyrolysis of pattern materials,
that is, molten metal feeding during pouring was ob-
[1 ] X.Chen and J.E.Gruzleski: Int. J. Cast Metal. Res.,
1996, 9, 17.
[2 ] T.V.Molibog and H.Littleton: Proceedings of Lost
Foam Casting, AFS, Dallas, Texas, 2001, 71.
[3 ] K.Y.Kim and K.W.Lee: J. Mater. Sci. Technol., 2005,
21(5), 681
[4 ] ASM: Metals Handbook, Vol.15 Casting, 9th Edn,
1988.
[5 ] Michael GARAT: US patent 5014764, 1991.
[6 ] X.Yao and S.Shivkumar: Mater. Sci. Technol., 1997,
13, 841.
[7 ] E.E.Underwood: Quantitative Stereology, AddisonWesley, 1970.
[8 ] J.Z.Yi,
Y.X.Gao,
P.D.Lee,
H.M.Hower and
T.C.Lindley: Metall. Mater. Trans. A, 2003. 34(9),
1879.