Effect of binder and moisture content on compactibility and shear strength of river bed green sand mould

Abstract

Green sand mold casting process is an ancient manufacturing process where the manufacturing cost is very low and can produce intricate shape casting for different industrial applications. In recent years, the sand casting foundries are shifted from western countries to India and other Asian countries due to easy availability of manpower and raw materials. However, in India silica sand availability is decreasing gradually due to high production rate of sand casting products and huge civil construction, leads to increase in the cost of production of sand casting products. The current investigation aims to study the effect of binder and moisture percentage on local river bed sand mould compactibility and shear strength. The sand mould cylindrical specimens are fabricated as per American Foundry Society (AFS) to determine shear strength of the mould. The result shows that the mould compactibility decreases and shear strength increases with the increase in binder percentage. The optimum sand mould compactibility 52% and shear strength 0.56 kg/cm2 are observed at 7% moisture and 14% bentonite. Furthermore, the compactibility and shear strength of river bed sand mould and commercially used pure silica sand mould are compared and found local river bed sand may be used as alternative silica sand in green sand mould casting.