The Correlation between Molding Sand Characteristics and the Quality of Cast Beds of Machine Tools
The article describes issues related to the improvement of quality of casting when manufacturing cast beds and basic parts of machine tools. This improvement can be achieved through the application of combined casting technologies that make it possible to reduce metal consumption, prevent casting defects and rejects of the finished products. The analysis of modern molding sand-clay mixtures is performed. It shows that the quality of the sand-clay mold directly depends on its composition and the quality of the components. The authors consider the possibility of using hybrid molds made with the application of additive technologies. It allows manufacturing castings of complex configuration such as reduced-weight machine-tool beds of equal, or in some cases, enhanced characteristics. This combined technology incorporates the advantages of sand-clay mixtures (high malleability, gas permeability and good removability) as well as the advantages of additive technologies where you can make a mold of nearly any configuration, which is important when manufacturing machine-tool beds of complex shapes.