Investment Casting

Investment Casting

Investment casting, also known as lost wax casting, includes processes such as pressing wax, repairing wax, assembling trees, dipping slurry, melting wax, casting molten metal, and post-treatment. Lost wax casting is to use wax to make a wax mold of the part to be cast, and then coat the wax mold with mud, which is a mud mold. After the clay mold is dried, put it in hot water to melt the internal wax mold. Take out the clay mold from the melted wax mold and fire it into a pottery mold. Once roasted. Generally, a pouring port is left when making a mud mold, and then molten metal is poured from the pouring port. After cooling, the required parts are made.

Investment casting is an industrial process based on lost-wax casting, one of the oldest known metal-forming techniques.

The fragile wax patterns must withstand forces encountered during the mold making. Much of the wax used in investment casting can be reclaimed and reused. Lost-foam casting is a modern form of investment casting that eliminates certain steps in the process.

Water glass and silica sol investment casting are the two primary investment casting methods nowadays. The main differences are the surface roughness and cost of casting. Water glass method dewaxes into the high-temperature water, and the ceramic mold is made of water glass quartz sand. Silica sol method dewaxes into the flash fire, and silica sol zircon sand makes the ceramic mold. Silica sol method costs more but has the better surface than the water glass method.

The process can be used for both small castings of a few ounces and large castings weighing several hundred pounds. It can be more expensive than die casting or sand casting, but per-unit costs decrease with large volumes. Investment casting can produce complicated shapes that would be difficult or impossible with other casting methods. It can also produce products with exceptional surface qualities and low tolerances with minimal surface finishing or machining required.

Production Process

Produce a master pattern—Create a mould—Produce wax patterns—Assemble wax patterns—Apply investment materials—Dewax—Burnout preheating—Pouring—Divesting

   Alloys Cast and Part Weight Range

      For small volume order, we can provide investment casting parts made of aluminum alloys, such as A356T6, A6061, and A514.2 (AC7A).

      For structural parts, customers can use carbon steels, such as SUS 304, or AISI 4140.

      The part weight we provide is from 3 g to 5 kg (aluminum).