Journal of Materials Processing Tech.

255 (2018) 559–569

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Journal of Materials Processing Tech.

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jmatprotec

Reclamation of used green sand in small scale foundries T

a a a,⁎ b c
Mohd Moiz Khan , Manvendra Singh , Sanjay M. Mahajani , G.N. Jadhav , Shashank Mandre
a
Department of Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, 400076, India
b
Department of Earth Science, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, 400076, India
c
Department of Metallurgy, Government Polytechnic, Kolhapur, 410064, India

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Disposal of Used Foundry Green Sand (UFGS) remains one of the significant challenges faced by foundry industry
Green sand nowadays. Experiments were performed to reduce the total clay content from 12% to as low as 2.2% in waste
Clay content foundry sand. Three prototypes were developed during the course of this work. They include vertical fluidized
Mechanical attrition bed, horizontal fluidized bed and a novel ball-mill type attrition and sieving unit. The cost per ton of reclaimed
Reclamation
sand is higher in case of fluidized bed based prototypes while in case of attrition and sieving based prototype, it
Economics
is less than half of the cost of the fresh sand. The experimental data generated on the two-stage attrition and
sieving unit under different conditions is further used to arrive at a semi-empirical correlation and the optimum
set of design and operating parameters to get the best performance.

1. Introduction and life. According to a report by Coastal regulation zone notification

According to a modern casting staff ; report, 2013 (AFS, 2013),
India is the third largest producer of castings in the world with annual
production of about 10 million metric tons per annum between
2010–2011. The Indian foundry also expects an investment of 3 billion
USD in another 10 years to meet the demand of 30 million tons of
castings in the country. Foundry industry uses sand for the production
of molds and cores and it is one of the largest consumers of sand.
Pouring of molten metal into the molds at higher temperature
(> 1000 °C) leads to deactivation of bentonite based binders present in
the sand. These binders are responsible for the strength of mold. The
deactivated bentonite binder forms a dead coating on the surface of
sand making it useless for further molding operations. According to the
Institute of Indian Foundry men report (2011), there are approximately
4600 foundry units in India, out of which, around 80% are small and
medium scale foundries. Stringent regulations of pollution control
board and government regarding waste disposal and sand mining have
brought many of these small-scale foundries on the verge of closure.
The presence of dead binder results in dumping of vast quantities of
sand either in a landfill or creation of sand hills. The waste sand con-
tains many heavy metals (Pb, Mn, Sn, Cu and Zn) which can leach into
the ground and cause ground water pollution (Siddique et al., 2010; Ji
et al., 2001; Sawai et al., 2016). In another study, Miguel et al. (2012)
reported that the open sand hills result in the enhanced particulate
matter in the surrounding areas causing risk to health and life. Thus,
waste foundry sand, if untreated, poses a threat to both environment
Ministry of environment and forests (2011), the government of India
has banned sand mining in many places which have resulted in a sharp
increase in the cost of fresh sand available. The government of Ma-
harashtra state in India also issued a notice to foundries operating in the
state in 2014, which prevents them from dumping the waste sand near
Industrial area. The nearest dumping site is typically more than 25 km
away from the nearest foundry cluster. These medium and small scale
cannot bear the dumping costs associated with waste sand nor can they
afford the costly reclamation methods available today. All in all, there
is a need for cost effective solution at small or medium scale to address
this issue.
Past studies are available on the use of used foundry green sand
(UFGS) in other industries like in the field of constructions and ceramics
etc. (Basar and Aksoy, 2012; Siddique and Singh, 2011; Furlani et al.
2012), but not much work has been done to reclaim and use waste sand
within the foundry itself. Some large scale reclamation solutions are
available in the market, but none of these are suitable or economical for
small and medium scale foundries, which require reclamation capacity
as low as 1000 kg/day. Use of reclaimed sand within the foundry would
improve the economics and efficiency of the process, and reduce its
harmful impact on the environment. The major hurdles in design and
optimization of sand reclamation are, limited literature, unavailability
of systematic data and theoretical models, which would quantify the
amount of attrition force required to remove the coating of dead ben-
tonite from sand surface.
Binder such as bentonite, is used in the preparation of green sand for

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: sanjaym@iitb.ac.in (S.M. Mahajani).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2018.01.005
Received 11 November 2017; Received in revised form 8 January 2018; Accepted 9 January 2018
Available online 10 January 2018
0924-0136/ © 2018 Published by Elsevier B.V.
M.M. Khan et al.
molding purpose. It is aluminium phyllosilicate consisting mostly of
montmorillonite clay mineral. Montmorillonite has an alternating tet-
rahedral structure of both silicon and aluminium atoms surrounded by
oxygen (Adamis et al., 2005). This results in a layered structure which
appears as flat plates. Water is adsorbed on these plates and this is the
reason why bentonite expands when mixed with water and shrinks
when dry. Sodium bentonite is used in the preparation of large castings
that use dry moulds while calcium bentonite finds applications in
smaller castings, which use green or wet moulds. The surface of ben-
tonite is ionic which, in the presence of water, helps in creation of
sticky coating on the surface of sand grains. This property of bentonite
is responsible for the production of moulds. Bentonite clay or mon-
tmorillonite has huge water absorbing capacity and a significant po-
tential for cation exchange. Murray (1991) showed that water mole-
cules are trapped in the interstitial sites. At around 100–200 °C, water
held between planar sheets is lost while structural water, i.e. the hy-
droxyl groups start disintegrating at around 450–500 °C. Further
heating to around 850 °C leads to the breaking of crystal structure and
unwanted phases like cordierite, mullite and cristobalite formed. As
shown by Parker (1988), at 100–400 °C, bentonite loses its property by
absorbing water rapidly. This deactivated bentonite is not suitable for
molding purposes and must be removed in order to reclaim waste
foundry sand.
The most common reclamation methods involve dry reclamation
which requires the application of mechanical forces and wet reclama-
tion wherein, chemicals like sulfuric acid, sodium hydroxide etc. are
added to remove the coating of dead binders from the surface of the
sand (Zanetti and Fiore, 2003). Studies in the past have shown that wet
reclamation is superior to dry reclamation methods. Unfortunately, wet
reclamation methods are associated with the dumping of large amounts
of chemical sludge generated in the process. Dry reclamation method
involves either mechanical treatment or thermal treatment or a com-
bination of both. Cruz et al. (2009) showed that the total clay content
can be significantly lowered just by mechanical treatment. Thermal
reclamation is the most widely accepted mode of sand reclamation.
According to Lucarz (2015), the performed investigations indicated that
the thermal reclamation of spent molding sand knocked-out from the
mold could fully substitute the mechanical reclamation. Cruz et al.
(2009) reported that the thermal treatment is known to enhance the
removal of dead clay from the waste green sand. It is a general per-
ception that mechanical attrition alone is not sufficient to reclaim green
sand. However, a detailed theoretical basis for the same is not evident
in the literature, and hence, one can not generalize that thermal
treatment is necessary for the reclamation. Thermal reclamation is
energy intensive and small, or medium foundries may not afford it. This
study, therefore, exploits the principles of only mechanical attrition and
shear force to bring down total clay content within acceptable limit
without compromising on the strength and quality of the sand. The
above forces can be exerted either by particle-particle interactions or
particle-wall interactions, though fluidization, or interactions with the
external entities (e.g. Agate balls) of appropriate material and weight,
introduced in the unit. Three different units are developed and tested.
They are compared based on their performances and the associated
costs. Finally, an analysis of a market-ready two-stage unit that per-
forms both attrition and sieving is provided, and the data generated is
used to arrive at a semi-empirical correlation for dead clay in the sand
at any given time. The correlation allows one to design a unit at a re-
quired scale.
2. Experimental work
2.1. Analytical methods
2.1.1. Total clay and active clay
The method of analysis for active and dead clay contents is adapted
from the guidelines mentioned in Indian Standards IS 1918:1966 on
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Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 559–569
Physical testing of foundry sands. To estimate active clay, 5 g sample of
sand is put into a beaker with 50 ml distilled water. The suspension of
sand and water is boiled for 1 min and left out to come down to room
temperature. Once the beaker cools down, 2.5 ml of 0.5 N H2SO4 and
around 3.74 g methylene blue powder in 1000 ml distilled water are
added. The sand-water suspension thus formed is titrated using this
methylene blue solution till a blue coloured ring is formed on a
whatman filter paper by a glass rod dipped in the suspension. The vo-
lume of methylene blue corresponds to the amount of active clay.
The active clay content in the dumped green sand is typically less
than 5%. Once the sand is thermally treated at around 583 °C, the active
clay content becomes almost zero. To calculate the amount of total clay,
a separate procedure is followed. This method is based on the fact that
bentonite reacts with sodium hydroxide. A 25 ml solution of 30 g/l
NaOH is added in 475 ml distilled water and contacted with 50 g dried
sand. After 60 min of stirring, particles are allowed to settle down for
10 min. The particles with diameter less than 20 μ have settling time of
more than 10 min. Sand is filtered out and kept for drying at 110 °C for
2 h. The loss in weight from actual sample of 50 g gives the amount of
total clay. Dead clay content is found out by subtracting active clay
from the total clay.
2.1.2. Grain fineness number (GFN)
GFN gives an indicator of the permeability of the sand. The sand
with higher grain fineness number has lower permeability making it
difficult for hot gases to escape from the mold, causing blisters on the
surface of the casting produced. On the other hand, if fineness number
is low, it may cause metal run off ; into the pores of the mold. A par-
ticular GFN is a basic requirement for a type of sand to be eligible for
use in foundry industry. GFN also gives an idea about the particle size
distribution. GFN is the number of meshes per centimeter of that sieve
which would allow to pass the sand mixture considering all the particles
were of same diameter. Typical values of GFN lies between 40–70.
2.1.3. Compressive strength
A standard cylindrical mold of length x diameter of
72 mm × 36 mm was prepared using the sand to be tested. The active
clay content and moisture content were kept at around 8–10% and
8–10%, respectively. Sample was placed in a Universal Testing Machine
(UTM) and load was applied. Industrial practice suggests that a com-
pressive strength of more than 90 kPa is required.
2.1.4. Acid demand value
50 g of dried sample is added to 50 ml of distilled water and 50 ml of
0.1 N HCl. The mixture is stirred for 5–10 min using magnetic stirrer at
around 100 rpm and allowed to settle for 1 h. The resulting mixture is
back titrated with 0.1 N NaOH to pH 3–5 while stirring. The amount of
acid consumed at each pH level, at room temperature, is equal to the
acid demand value of the sand.
2.2. Vertical fluidized bed
An acrylic pipe with 10 cm diameter and 75 cm length was used to
make the body of the fluidized bed. The provisions for the sampling of
inlet and outlet streams were made. A distributor at the bottom inlet
was responsible for distributing air for fluidization. The air from com-
pressor was supplied at diff ;erent pressures and for diff ;erent times to
study the eff ;ect of fluidization on removal of dead coating. Samples
were collected at different intervals and analyzed for total and active
clay contents. Schematic of experimental setup is shown in Fig. 1.
Several experiments were conducted for various samples of sand at
different temperatures, flow rates and fluidization times.
2.3. Horizontal fluidized bed
As opposed to vertical fluidized bed, which provides only inter-
M.M. Khan et al.
Fig. 1. Schematic of vertical fluidized bed experimental setup.
Fig. 2. Schematic of horizontal fluidized bed experimental setup.
particle attrition, attrition bed provides impact as well as inter-particle
attrition. In this case, particles are forced to collide against the column
wall, which results in an increased impact force. The impact force as-
sists in removal of coating on the sand particles. The schematic of
horizontal attrition bed is shown in Fig. 2. Compressed air at a fixed
operating pressure is passed through one or multiple nozzles. The
nozzles have diameter of 4.5 mm and 9 mm. The height of bed is
120 cm, length is 60 cm and width is 20 cm. The two dominant me-
chanisms responsible for attrition in horizontal bed are wall impact and
inter-particle attrition due to fluidization. Since air enters the bed via
nozzles at a very high velocity, it creates a low-pressure region near the
nozzles. This sets up an internal circulation of sand and the sand falling
in front of the nozzles is pushed towards the wall.
2.4. Attrition and sieving
A known quantity of sand was placed on a 53 μm SS sieve and
pebbles of diff ;erent weights were added to the sieve to exert the right
amount of force required to remove the coating. The sieve was then
installed on an automatic sieve shaker and the experiment was run till
no further fines are produced. The schematic of this set-up can be seen
in Fig. 3.
In this experiment, agate pebbles of diff ;erent weights were added
in the sieve along with the sand. These pebbles / balls provided the
necessary shear force required for attrition. The principle behind this
set of experiments is similar to the ball mill but right amount of force
has to be provided to avoid crushing or grinding leading to wastage of
sand.
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Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 559–569
Fig. 3. Attrition and sieving experimental setup.
Fig. 4. Total clay content vs fluidization time for experiments performed in vertical
fluidized bed.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Vertical fluidization
It can be seen from Fig. 4 that as the fluidization time is increased,
the total clay content decreases. Increasing operating pressure also has
a positive effect on clay removal. As evident from Appendix A Tables
A1–A3, dead clay content becomes constant at around 3.3 percent
while active clay keeps on reducing. Our target is to reduce the dead
clay content. This shows that dead clay cannot be removed beyond a
certain limit in vertical fluidized bed by just adjusting pressure or
fluidization time. As mentioned before, the main mechanism of clay
removal in fluidized bed is the particle-particle attrition. Although some
amount of wall-particle attrition is also present, it is not significant. The
results thus indicate that only particle-particle collision or attrition is
not sufficient to remove the dead binder from sand surface.
3.2. Horizontal fluidization
A 5 hp compressor was used to pressurize the air that is introduced
in horizontal fluidization bed
containing 10 kg waste sand. Fig. 5 shows that the total clay content
decreases with increase in operating pressure. The total clay content as
low as 2.2% is achieved as compared to 3.3% in the vertical fluidised
bed. In this case, impact with the wall and attrition between sand
particles, both mechanism contribute towards weakening of dead clay
coating on sand particle. Changing the nozzle diameter from 4.5 mm to
9 mm did not have any effect on the clay removal efficiency.
3.3. Attrition and sieving
The experiments on texture analyser indicate that a vertical force
M.M. Khan et al.
Fig. 5. Total clay content v/s fluidization time in horizontal fluidized bed.
Fig. 6. Effect of weight of attrition media on amount of sand crushed.
greater than 0.5 N crushes a used sand particle while a force greater
than 0.3 N crushes a fresh sand particle. The higher breaking strength of
the used sand particle is because of additional strength of coating on its
surface. The weight of the pebbles should be carefully chosen such that
the sand particles are not crushed. The effect of attrition time on clay
removal can be observed from Fig. 6. As the weight is increased, lower
clay content is achieved at a lesser time. In second set of experiments,
the effect of weight of attrition media on sand particle breakage was
considered. The fines collected in the pan underneath the sieve were
analysed for the presence of quartz. If the fines contain quartz, it means
that sand is getting crushed. Fines can be distinguished from clay as
clay reacts with NaOH, which can then be siphoned off.
Fig. 7 shows the amount of sand crushed upon increasing the weight
of crushing media. The results clearly indicate that weight of attrition
media (balls, rods or pebbles) should be between 40–45 g to prevent the
crushing of given sand particles.
Fig. 7. Effect of weight of attrition media on the amount of sand crushed.
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Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 559–569
3.4. Characterization of sand samples
The fresh, waste and reclaimed sand were observed under Scanning
electron microscopy (SEM) and the smoothness of the surface that is
lost in waste sand, is regained considerably in the reclaimed sand as
shown in Fig. 8.
The surface of fresh sand is smooth because it is free from any sort of
deposits, due to the absence of bentonite as seen in Fig. 8(a). Fig. 8(b)
shows the uniform layer of clay and coal on the sand grains. During the
coating of clay and coal on the surface of sand grains, clay spreads
thoroughly and also goes inside the cracks and forms a very strong
bond. Fig. 8(c) shows the surface of waste foundry sand where the
deposits are clearly visible. These deposits are formed as a result of
deactivation of binders present in the green sand, due to high tem-
peratures encountered in the casting process. The reclaimed sand is
shown in Fig. 8(d). The deposits are absent and the surface has become
smoother. However, it still does not have the appearance of the fresh
sand because the dead clay is not completely removed.
The Inductive coupled plasma (ICP) analysis indicates that the silica
(SiO2) content of the fresh sand (98%) reduces considerably to as low as
82% in the waste sand. It is recovered back to greater than 90% in the
reclaimed sand. The fresh sand used for preparing green sand has
98.29% silica content, and the rest 1.71% is carbonates, metal oxides
etc. Table A4 (Appendix A) depicts the composition of different sands. It
shows the presence of clay and coal in green sand, and a low percentage
of silica content as compared to fresh sand. The composition of silica in
waste foundry sand was also found to be more as compared to green
sand because some oxides, carbonate, moisture, volatile matter etc.
were removed during the casting process. Further, the silica content
increased after mechanical treatment, and this happens because fines
were generated and separated from the reclaimed sand. Fines mainly
constitute of dead clay, active clay, carbonates, metal oxides etc.
4. Economics
The reclamation cost becomes one of the most important parameters
as this study is primarily for making sand reclamation accessible and
cost effective for smaller foundries, which can neither afford the large
reclamation costs nor do they have large throughput of waste sand. Cost
of electricity is taken as USD 1.10 per 10 units (kWh) of electricity
consumed. Based on the compressor run time and cost of electricity,
reclamation cost per ton of sand was calculated at different operating
pressures as given in Table 1. Any price above the cost of fresh sand
would not be acceptable in the market. Table 1 and 2 show cost and
quality of sand. The vertical fluidization leads to almost 14% savings
based on the operating cost but the total clay content of 4.2% is not
acceptable. Horizontal fluidization reduces the clay content to 2.2% but
at the expense of higher operating cost thereby leading to loss in sav-
ings of around 70%. The best mechanical reclamation method is sieving
and attrition, which results in savings of over 80% while maintaining
the desired quality of sand. The operating cost in case of sieving and
attrition experiments was calculated by noting the number of electricity
units (kWh) consumed in bringing down the clay content from 12% to
2.2%. The quality of sand obtained in each of the cases is mentioned in
Table 2. It may be noted that we have not included depreciation and
interest in the running cost.
The cost of reclaimed sand is fixed after surveying 120 small and
medium scale foundries and according to the survey the current cost of
reclaimed sand is acceptable to majority of stakeholders. Further im-
provements can be done such as, removing fines (< 20 μ) from the
waste sand before the treatment, therefore product loss will be lower. In
addition, reclaiming the sand just after knockout process may reduce
the cost of drying further.
M.M. Khan et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 559–569

Fig. 8. Scanning electron microscopy of foundry

sand.

Table 1
Operating cost of reclaimed sand. Cost of fresh sand is USD 48 per ton.

Case Total clay (%) Cost of reclamation per Savings / Loss

achieved ton sand (USD) (%)

Vertical Fluidization 4.2 41 +14

Horizontal 2.2 82 −70
Fluidization
Sieving & Attrition 2.2 08 +83

5. A two-stage complete prototype

A two-stage attrition based prototype is further developed based on
the lines of sieving and attrition experiments to reclaim 100 kg/h of
waste green sand. The device is divided in two parts as shown in Fig. 9.
The first stage is responsible for providing attrition by virtue of external
attrition media. Here, we use agate balls to provide the necessary at-
trition for removal of dead coating on the surface of the waste foundry
sand. The second stage that provides only inter-particle attrition, also
consists of a 50-μ steel mesh to separate all the dead coating that has
been weakened or removed in both the stages.
When waste foundry sand is fed into the device, it first undergoes
attrition offered by agate balls. The attrition between agate balls and
sand particles, and between sand particles and wall of the device, dis-
integrates the dead coating present on the surface of UFGS. The weight
of the agate balls is carefully chosen (Fig. 7) so that only the dead
coating is removed and sand particle is not crushed. The flow rate of
sand is monitored to provide the necessary residence time for attrition.
The optimal residence time is found out to be 25 min by performing
Fig. 9. Device for reclaiming used foundry green sand (UFGS).
several runs and optimizing the dead clay content. This time is similar
to the attrition contact time observed in Fig. 6. Subsequently, the sand
passes through second stage, wherein, particle-particle attrition or self-
rubbing of particles with each other results in further removal of dead
coating from the surface of sand. The 50-μ sieve separates the dead clay
from the product stream. The optimal residence time for second stage is
10 min. The device is also equipped with a heater and blower system to
maintain temperatures up to 200 °C, if necessary. High moisture con-
tent, typically more than 4%, makes it difficult to remove dead coating
from the sand. In cases where high moisture is encountered, the heater-
blower system can be turned on. Fuels like biomass pellets, wood, coal
etc. can be used in the heater. The process flow diagram for the device is
shown in Fig. 10. The parameters affecting reclamation of waste
foundry sand include rotating speed of device (rpm), weight of external
attrition media (agate balls), size of external attrition media (agate

Table 2
Quality of reclaimed sand when compared against recommended value.

Parameter Recommended value Vertical fluidization Horizontal fluidization Sieving & attrition Attrition device

AFS GFN 40–70 54 59 66 64

Total Clay (%) 2.0 4.2 2.2 2.2 2.2
Acid demand value (ml) <6 9–10 6-7 5–6 5-6
Compressive strength (kPa) > 90 110–120 115–120 115–125 115–120

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Fig. 10. Process flow diagram of green sand reclamation using multi stage attrition de-
vice.

Table 3
Total clay content upon using balls of different weights.

Ball weight (g) Clay content (%)

30 2.8
40 2.2
50 2.5 Fig. 13. Effect of temperature on total clay (%).
60 2.9

Fig. 14. Effect of attrition time on total clay (%).

Fig. 11. Effect of device rotation speed on total clay (%).

As evident from Figs. 11 and 12, there exist optimum values of
parameters like rotation speed, sand to balls weight ratio for minimum
residual clay content under given conditions. The rotation speed has to
be less than the critical speed of attrition device. If the speed ap-
proaches critical speed, the grinding media starts rotating along with
the wall of the device which does not achieve required attrition. The
desired sand to balls weight ratio allows one to use right quantity of
balls into the device. For higher sand/ball ratio, effective removal of
dead coating does not take place due to insufficient attrition. On the
other hand, if sand/ball ratio is less, that is when grinding media is
more, it results in crushing of sand rather than effective removal of
coating. Lastly, the attrition time is the time required inside the first
stage of device to remove dead binder coating. It was varied by chan-
ging the flow rate of the incoming sand to the unit. The shear force
between attrition media (agate balls) and sand particles and between
wall of device and sand particles, breaks the dead coating present on
the surface of the sand. The optimum values of parameters obtained
after performing rigorous experiments are summarized in Table 4. The
Fig. 12. Effect of sand / agate balls weight ratio on total clay (%).
Table 4
Optimum values of operating parameters for multi stage attrition device.
balls), breaking strength of the sand, moisture content, temperature,
sand/agate balls weight ratio. Table 3 shows the effect of ball weight on Parameter Optimum Value
the final clay content. Optimum is realised at 40 g in the present case.
Rotation speed (RPM) 30
The effect of other parameters namely rotation speed, sand to ball
Sand / balls weight ratio 2.5
weight ratio, temperature and attrition time are shown in Figs. 11–14, Temperature (°C) 130
respectively. Attrition time (minutes) 25
Ball weight (g) 40

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quality parameters of reclaimed sand obtained from this device are

already mentioned in Table 2.

6. Comparison of different prototypes

As described before, the development of process took place in

stages. First, a vertical fluidized bed was used to bring down the total
clay content to less than 2%. This demand was laid forward by the
foundry cluster. But since after several iterations, first process was not
even close to attaining 2% clay content, irrespective of the operating
conditions, the horizontal fluidized bed was developed. Horizontal bed,
due to increased number of effective collisions, was able to move closer
to the target clay content of 2% but at a significantly higher operating
cost (0.082 per kg; Table B1). The operating cost calculation for all the
three prototypes is given in Appendix B. The horizontal bed of the given
design was optimized by varying the parameters and it can be claimed
that this process is also able to give clay content close to 2% but this
process is not economically feasible for the end users i.e. the small Fig. 16. An exponential function curve fitted to experimental data. Here the sand/ball
foundry owners, due to excessive power requirement. The design weight ratio is 2.5 and varying rotation speed of attrition mill.
parameters such as number of nozzles, configuration etc. can be ma-
nipulated to reduce the cost further. However, that reduction is not
expected to be high enough to match the third option of ball-milling
type attrition, wherein, power requirement is minimal (0.008 USD per
kg; Table B1). The device is easy to operate and maintain.

7. Correlation for clay content

In this section, we propose a semi-empirical correlation that predicts

the clay content as a function of time and other operating parameters in
the case of attrition and sieving prototype. The trends in total clay
versus attrition time reveal that initial reduction in clay content is rapid,
and finally settles nearly at a steady value. This behaviour is similar to
the processes which follow the kinetics of exponential decay. Let ‘x’ be
the total clay content at a given time‘t’. As observed from Fig. 14, clay
content decreases with time.
dx
= f (x , t )
dt (1)
Fig. 17. An exponential function curve fitted to experimental data. Here the rotation
dx
versus ‘x’ was plotted and a curve was fitted to obtain an expression speed of attrition mill is 30 RPM and varying sand/ball weight ratio.
dt
and understand the effect of different parameters. The fitted curves for
experimental runs can be seen in Figs. 15–18, which show a good
agreement with the experimental data. The general equation for the
curve being:
dx
− = a + be cx
dt (2)

Fig. 18. An exponential function curve fitted to experimental data. Here the rotation
speed of attrition mill is 30 RPM and varying sand/ball weight ratio.

Eq. (2) has two parts, an exponential term which has parameters ‘b’,
‘c’ and one constant term which has parameter ‘a’. Effect of each of
these parameters is studied below.
Fig. 15. An exponential function curve fitted to experimental data. Here the sand/ball Upon solving Eq. (2) for x, we get,
weight ratio is 2.5 and rotation speed of attrition mill is 30 RPM.

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Table 5 Table 6
Parameters for different values of sand/ball weight ratio. Parameters for different values of rotation speed.

Parameters Sand/ball weight ratio Parameters Rotation speed (RPM)

0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00 2.50 3.00 3.50 10 20 30 40 50

a 0.59 0.59 0.61 0.61 0.59 0.59 0.59 a 0.31 0.51 0.74 0.87 0.30
b −14.49 −9.74 −6.77 −4.43 −2.59 −3.16 −5.74 b −3.43 −3.39 −2.49 −2.87 −2.51
c −0.66 −0.66 −0.64 −0.63 −0.66 −0.66 −0.66 c −2.56 −1.38 −0.32 −0.31 −1.46

e ack + act b
ln( a
− a)
x=−
c (3)
where ‘k’ is the integration constant. The value of ‘k’ can be found by
using the value of total clay at t = 0. The major parameters on which
clay content depends are sand/ball weight ratio and rotation speed.
Factors like ball weight and size are limited by the breaking/crushing
strength of sand which largely depends on the source of sand. Tem-
perature plays an important role in mechanical attrition only when
moisture content in feed sand is more than 4%.

7.0.1. Effect of sand/ball weight ratio

The sand/ball ratio was varied from 0.5 to 3.5 and for each sand/
ball ratio, dx/dt was plotted and the parameters a, b and c were ob-
tained by fitting the best fit curve through the data points. The values of
a, b and c are given in Table 5. It can be seen from Fig. 19, that the
values of parameters a and c do not change while b changes sig-
nificantly as the sand/ball weight ratio is varied. Fig. 20. Variation of parameters a and c upon changing rotation speed of attrition device.
The parameter b itself fits a quadratic curve of the form
Ar2 + Br + C = 0 when plotted against sand/ball weight ratio (r). The parameter b here is from 2.49 to 3.43 which is not significant.
peak value of b gives the optimal value of sand/ball weight ratio. It can The effect of rotation speed of drum is largely on parameter c. It is
be inferred that the parameter ‘b’ is an explicit function of sand/ball important to note that the optimal rotation speed (RPM) is in the range
ratio. The model gives a good prediction for the sand / ball weight ratio 30–40 RPM, which still occurs at the peak value of all the three para-
between 0.5–4.0. meters. The variation of parameters a and c can be seen from Fig. 20.
The change in parameter a is also not significant. The model is valid for
7.0.2. Effect of rotation speed (RPM) rotation speeds between 10–60 rpm.

Eq. (1) was fitted with experimental data obtained at different va-
lues of rotation speeds and the value of parameters a, b and c were
obtained. They are given in Table 6. In this case, all three parameters
change upon changing the rotation speed of ball mill. Unlike the case of
sand/ball ratio, for which b varies from 2.59 to 14.49, the change in
7.0.3. Significance of parameters a,b and c
While b reflects the effect of sand/ball weight ratio (r), c signifies
the effect of change in RPM (s) of attrition device on the reduction in
clay content. Both b and c follow parabolic equation obtained by fitting
a second order polynomial.

b = f(r) = −20.8 + 13.65r − 2.63r2 (4)

c = f(s) = −5.04 + 0.277s − 0.004s 2

(5)

A limiting case, when there are no balls in the attrition device,

implies that the sand / ball ratio is −∞, which in turn makes b = −∞.
Substituting this in Eq. (2), we get:
-dx
=a
dt (6)
Integrating Eq. (6), we get:

x = xo – at (7)

Fig. 19. The variation of parameters a–c upon varying sand/ball ratio.
where, xo is the initial clay content. Eq. (7) shows that even when there
are no balls in the attrition device, clay content decreases at a constant
rate. This is because the self attrition or rubbing between the grains of
sand amongst themselves and attrition between walls of the attriton
device and sand grains. Parameter a can thus be linked with particle-

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M.M. Khan et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 559–569

value of a comes out to be 0.36, which is of the same order as men-

tioned in Tables 5 and 6. Beyond 14 min, the clay content becomes
constant at 9%, no matter for how long it is subjected to attrition. The
parity plot comparing observed and predicted values by the correlation
(Eq. (3)) in Fig. 22 shows that model is in reasonably good agreement
with the experimental results.

8. Conclusions

Mechanical methods without any heat treatment can be used to

reclaim green sand as opposed to current reclamation methods which
involve burning the sand to around 800 °C. Different strategies were
studied for the reclamation of foundry sand.

Fig. 21. Plot of clay content vs time for self-attrition case. The slope of best fit straight
line is -0.36. The experiment was performed by rotating the attrition device without any
• In the vertical fluidized bed, which is based on the principle of
particle-particle attrition, clay content was reduced to 4.2% from
balls.
whooping 12%. The particle–particle attrition, at ambient tem-
perature, is not enough to further bring down the clay content.
• In horizontal fluidized bed which also exploited particle–wall col-
lision and impact in addition to particle–particle attrition, the total
clay content was brought down to as low as 2.2%. However, pre-
liminary cost estimation indicates that cost of reclamation by this
method is more than the cost of fresh sand owing to higher oper-
ating costs.
• A ball-mill type prototype that uses particle-particle and particle-
ball attrition, combined with sieving, showed promising results, and
a total clay content of up to 2.2% was achieved in a cost-effective
manner.

It may be thus concluded that simple mechanical means of re-

clamation without heat treatment (∼800 °C) is promising and has a
potential to improve economics of sand reclamation process, making
Fig. 22. Predicted values vs observed values of clay content at different operating con- reclamation economically viable for small and medium scale foundries.
ditions. Here s/b = sand/ball weight ratio and RPM = rotation speed of attrition device.
For predicted values appropriate values of parameters a–c were chosen from Tables 5 and
6.
Acknowledgement

particle attrition.The experimental data for particle-particle attrition The financial support received from Tata Centre for Technology and
when fitted with a linear curve gives a good fit as shown in Fig. 21. The Design, IIT Bombay is gratefully acknowledged.

Appendix A

Table A1
Clay content v/s fluidization time for a vertical fluidized bed at 1 bar.

Time (mint) Total Clay (%) Active Clay (%) Dead Clay (%)

15 12 5 7
30 10.5 4 6.5
45 9 3.5 5.5
60 8.5 3.2 5.3
75 6.2 2.5 3.7
90 6.2 2.5 3.7

Table A2
Clay content v/s fluidization time for a vertical fluidized bed at 1.5 bar.

Time (mint) Total Clay (%) Active Clay (%) Dead Clay (%)

15 11 4.5 6.5
30 9.6 3.9 5.7
45 8.2 3.2 5
60 7.4 2.9 4.5
75 5.4 2.1 3.3
90 5.4 2.1 3.3

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Table A3
Clay content v/s fluidization time for a vertical fluidized bed at 2 bar.

Time (mint) Total Clay (%) Active Clay (%) Dead Clay (%)

15 10 4.2 5.8
30 8.9 3.6 5.3
45 7.1 2.9 4.2
60 6.1 2.4 3.7
75 4.2 0.9 3.3
90 4.2 0.9 3.3

Table A4
Chemical compositions of foundry sand.

Metal Oxides Fresh sand Green sand Waste sand Reclaimed sand

SiO2 98.29 82.98 86.4 90.2

Al2O3 0.19 4.96 4.5 1.9
Fe2O3 0.72 3.90 4 2.1
Na2O 0.10 1.06 0.45 0.4
K2O 0.00 1.23 0.8 0.6
CaO 0.28 0.89 0.45 0.3
MgO 0.04 0.62 0.25 0.3
MnO 0.01 0.06 0 0
TiO2 0.81 0.43 0.3 0.3
P2O5 0.01 0.06 0.1 0.1
LOI 0.18 5.90 2.7 3.5
TOTAL 100.6 102.02 99.95 99.70

Table B1
Operating cost comparison of the prototypes.

S. No. Prototypes Cost per kg (USD)

1 First prototype (Vertical fluidized bed) 0.041

2 Second prototype (Horizontal fluidized bed) 0.082
3 Third prototype (Ball mill with sieve filter) 0.008

Appendix B

Operating cost calculation for all the three Prototypes

10 kg sand was processed through all the three prototypes. Maximum power of all the electric motor has been considered for this calculations.
Price of electricity was considered to be USD 0.11 per unit (kWatt-h) in India.
1. First prototype (Vertical fluidized bed)
A 2 hp compressor was used to pressurize air, which was then used in vertical fluidization bed. Total clay of 4.20% at 2.0 bar pressure was
obtained from a compressor that runs for 2.5 h. (The compressor run for 2.5 h to fluidized sand in a Vertical bed for 75 min. at 2 bar).
Power consumed in 2.5 h. = 2 × 2.5 = 5 hp = 3.728 kWatt-h.
Total Operating cost = 3.728 × 0.11 = USD 0.410.
Operating cost per kg of sand = USD 0.041.
2. Second prototype (Horizontal fluidized bed)
A 5 hp compressor was used to pressurize air which was then used in the bed. Total clay of 2.20% was achieved at 3.5 bar pressure over 2 h. (The
compressor run for 2 h to fluidized sand in a Horizontal bed for 90 min. at 3.5 bar).
Power consumed in 2 h. = 5 × 2 = 10 hp = 7.457 kWatt-h.
Total Operating cost = 7.457 × 0.11 = USD 0.820.
Operating cost per kg of sand = USD 0.082.
3. Third prototype (Ball mill with sieve filter)
A 2 hp electric motor was used to rotate the ball mill with sieve filter. Total clay of 2.20% was obtained at 30 RPM in 25 min. A 0.5 hp motor was
used to dry the sand. (See Table 4 in the manuscript).
Power consumed in 25 min. = 0.84 + 0.21 = 1.05 hp = 0.783 kWatt-h.
Total Operating cost = 0.783 × 0.11 = USD 0.0861.
Operating cost per kg of sand = USD 0.008.

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