Influence of Sawdust Ash Addition on Molding Sand Properties and Quality of Iron Castings

Sand molding casting has been widely used for a long time. But, one of its main drawbacks is that surface quality of the castings is not good enough for some applications. The purposes of this research were to investigate the effect of addition of sawdust ash of rubber wood (SARW) on molding sand properties and the surface quality of iron castings and to find an appropriate level of SARW with the appropriate properties of the iron castings. The molding sand compositions for making a sand mold consisted of the recycled molding sand, bentonite, water and SARW. The percentage levels of SARW were 0%, 0.1%, 0.2%, 0.3% and 0.4%. The different proportions of molding sand samples were investigated for the molding sand properties including permeability, compression strength and hardness. The results showed that addition of SARW had an effect on the molding sand properties. The appropriate percentage proportion of molding sand was obtained at 95.8% recycled molding sand, 0.8% bentonite, 3% water and 0.4% SARW. There were statistically significant differences of mean surface roughness and hardness values of the iron castings made from molding sand samples without SARW addition and the appropriate percentage proportion of molding sand. In addition, the average surface roughness value of the iron castings made from the sand mold with the appropriate percentage proportion of molding sand was ~40% lower than those of the iron castings made from molding sand samples without SARW addition.