Manufacturing Commons^™

Study Of Ceramic Slurries For Investment Casting With Ice Patterns, Qingbin Liu, Ming-Chuan Leu, Harish Jose, Von Richards

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Ice patterns generated by rapid freeze prototyping or a molding process can be used to make ceramic investment molds for metal castings. Due to the use of ice, the ceramic slurries must be poured around the pattern and cured at sub-freezing temperatures. Success of this process depends greatly on the mold strength after the gelation of the slurries. This paper describes the experimental results of the mold strength after the gelation of the slurries under different compositions. The parameters considered include mixing time, alumino-silicate vs. fused silica ratio, volume of binder, and volume of catalyst. The strength of the gelled …