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Effect of molding parameters on chemically bonded sand mold properties

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DOI: 10.1016/j.jmapro.2016.03.007

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 Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Manufacturing Processes

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

Effect of molding parameters on chemically bonded sand

mold properties
Himanshu Khandelwal ∗ , B. Ravi
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai 400076, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Chemically bonded sand molds and cores have better mechanical properties and produce more dimen-
Received 31 December 2015 sionally accurate castings, compared to green sand molds, and hence are being increasingly preferred for
Received in revised form 9 March 2016 near net shape metal parts. While it is well known that the properties and quality of a mold depend on
Accepted 9 March 2016
its material composition and molding process, this has not been investigated well for chemically bonded
molds. In this work, the effect of sand grain size, binder percentage and curing time (each varied in three
Keywords:
levels) on the mechanical properties (compression strength, shear strength and core hardness) as well as
Sand-casting
dimensional changes (shrinkage) of no-bake chemically-bonded molds and cores was studied through
No-bake binder
Chemically bonded mold
lab experiments. Their mechanical properties were found to increase with an increase in binder con-
Mechanical property tent and curing time; and decrease with increasing grain fineness number. The shrinkage was found to
Shrinkage increase with an increase in all three process parameters. The results are explained in terms of bonding
Optimization and curing phenomena of binders, and evaporation of solvent. These are also supported by SEM analysis
of crosslinked resin bridges between sand grains. The findings were incorporated into a multi-objective
optimization model to obtain the desired combination of mold properties, which is solved as a linear
programming problem. The model and its results were successfully verified through experiments. This
work paves the way for automatic optimization of molding parameters of chemically-bonded sand molds
and cores, to achieve the desired quality.
© 2016 The Society of Manufacturing Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Near-net shape metal parts can be manufactured by many
routes; yet metal casting is still the most preferred process due
to its ability to produce intricate shaped parts in a variety of metals
and range of order quantity at a low cost compared to either sub-
tractive or additive manufacturing [1]. Among various metal casting
processes, green sand casting is the most widely used one world-
wide, due to the availability of raw materials (sand and bentonite),
established process equipment, and ease of recycling of molding
materials [2–4]. This process is however, unable to meet the ever-
tightening requirements of original equipment manufacturers in
terms of internal soundness, dimensional accuracy and surface
finish, and has to be followed up with considerable machining
[5,6]. These limitations are reduced by some of the newer mold-
ing processes, which use various chemical binders instead of clay
or bentonite [7,8]. The binder systems are classified according to
the curing mechanism and the type of chemicals used: heat cured,
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 9167481947.
E-mail address: khandelwal iit@yahoo.com (H. Khandelwal).
cold box, and no-bake [9,10]. The quality of the mold, in terms of
strength, hardness and dimensional stability plays a significant role
in achieving dimensionally accurate castings with good mechani-
cal properties [11,12]. The quality of the mold depends on the type
of sand used (silica or zircon; grain size and shape), binder compo-
sition (proportion of different chemicals), type of molding process
(manual, machine), and the curing time.
Several researchers have investigated the effect of molding com-
position on the dimensional stability and mechanical properties of
sand molds [9,11,13–16]. Werling [14] conducted a set of experi-
ments with different molding mixtures to investigate their effect
on core strength, shrinkage, and sand flowability. Dimensional
changes in chemically bonded mold have been investigated by
Showman et al. [15], who reported continuous shrinkage of mold
over the curing time, and ascribed it to shortening of the resin
bridges. Khandelwal and Ravi [9] also observed the shrinkage in
cores prepared using alkyd urethane binder system, and linked
it to the evaporation of the solvent. Core shrinkage and hardness
were found to be affected by the amount of resin used and not
by the amount of catalyst. Lowe and Showman [16] used various
binder systems with different type of sands and process conditions.
Their research showed that sand grain size, shape, distribution and

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2016.03.007
1526-6125/© 2016 The Society of Manufacturing Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
128 H. Khandelwal, B. Ravi / Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133

density also affect dimensional changes of sand molds. Cores with
fine sand grain size were found to have more shrinkage and less
hardness for the same percentage of binder.
A few researchers have explored different techniques for opti-
mizing the composition of sand molds to achieve the desired
quality, though most of the work was confined to green sand
molding [2,17–20]. The molding composition was optimized for
quality improvement of iron casting by Kumar et al. [17], who
used Taguchi method to minimize the defects (shifts, blow holes,
sand drop, warpage, etc.) in housing covers. Saikaew et al. and
Kumar et al. [2,17] used mixed experimental design and propaga-
tion of error analysis to optimize green sand molding composition.
Ganesan et al. [18] introduced the use of Normal Boundary Intersec-
tion method for optimization of green sand molds. The technique
was used for obtaining the local maximum solution of the defined
problem. Kumaravadivel and Natarajan [19] used response sur-
face method to optimize molding composition (recycled molding
sand, bentonite, and water) of green sand casting. They developed
a non-linear regression model to optimize permeability, compres-
sion strength and shear strength of chromite-based resin bonded
system.
In general, there appears to be very little work investigating the
effect of material composition and process parameters on the prop-
erties of no-bake chemically-bonded sand molds. Further, there
appears to be no report of any systematic approach to optimize
the above parameters to achieve the desired combination of mold
properties. This has been taken up in the present work. The design
of experiments was carried out, followed by the analysis of results,
understanding the influence of individual parameters on mold
properties, and finally the formulation and validation of an opti-
mization model. The overall methodology is illustrated in Fig. 1,
and described in the following sections.
2. Experimental work
The experimental work was taken up to investigate the effect
of mold composition (sand grain fineness and binder content)
and curing time on mold properties: compression strength, shear
strength, core hardness, and core shrinkage.
The sand core samples were prepared using oil urethane no-
bake binder system. This three part binder system comprises alkyd
resin, metallic catalyst, and polymeric MDI (methyl di-isocyanate).
Their proportions were selected based on the weight of sand.
Double screened silica sand was used for preparing the molds
Step 1 - Deciding the Objecves
• Invesgate the effect of molding parameters on mold properes
• Opmizaon of mold composion to obtain the desired range of properes
Step 2 - Determine Process Variable and their level
• Parameters selected: Binder percentage, Sand Grain Size, Curing Time
• All parameters varied in three levels: Low, Medium, High
Step 3 - Experimental Plan
Table 1
Experiment parameters and their levels.
Designation Parameter (unit) Level 1 Level 2 Level 3
G Sand grain size (GFN) 40 60 80
B Binder (wt% of sand) 1.6 2 2.4
T Curing time (h) 1 2 4
and cores. Three key molding parameters were selected based
on a preliminary study, which included sand grain size, binder
composition, and curing time. The grain fineness number (G) of
silica sand used for these experiments was varied in three levels:
40, 60, and 80, which are common in industrial use. The standard
deviation of three test samples of sand with GFN 40, 60, 80 are 2.45,
2.17 and 1.78. The percentage of alkyd resin binder (B) was varied
in three levels: 1.6, 2 and 2.4, by weight percentage of sand. The
curing time (T) was also varied in three levels: 1 h, 2 h and 4 h. All
parameters and their levels are listed in Table 1.
Taguchi design of experiments (DOEs) methodology was
employed to determine the optimum number of experiments and
to study the influence of various parameters on mold quality. The
appropriate orthogonal array selection is based on the experimen-
tal resolution required, which is estimated by degree of freedom
(DOF). Two DOF for each factors (number of levels-1), suggests
minimum 6 DOF required. An L9 orthogonal array was selected,
wherein the experimental design consists of nine experimental
runs, and various factors were assigned in three columns of the
array, as shown in Table 2.
Test samples were produced by oil urethane chemical binder
system in line with AFS (American Foundry Society) standard
guidelines. Alkyd resin percentages were selected as shown in
Table 1. The amount of catalyst and cross-linking agent was taken
as 10% and 20% of the amount of weight of alkyd resin. The sam-
ples were prepared using the assigned experimental array shown
in Table 2. The chemicals mentioned were mixed well with the
sand using a sand mixer. Cylindrical samples of 5 cm diameter and
10 cm length were produced using a gang compression core box,
for compression and shear strength measurements. Rectangular
blocks of size 15 cm × 15 cm × 5 cm (for hardness measurement)
and cylindrical samples of 20 mm diameter and 100 mm length
(for shrinkage measurement) were also prepared. All the test
samples were produced in similar laboratory conditions of tem-
perature and humidity. All four types of test samples are shown in
Fig. 2.
The compression strength and shear strength were measured
using a digital universal strength testing machine (Versatile Equip-
ments Pvt. Ltd, Kolhapur), shown in Fig. 3. This is a pneumatic
machine which can exert a continuous direct load up to 400 kg;
it can measure compression strength up to 80 kg/cm2 and shear
strength up to 64 kg/cm2 . The machine has a loading frame with
provision to accommodate various samples, attachments and cal-
ibration kit. The core hardness is measured using a scratch tester

• Taguchi based design of experiments Table 2

• Full factorial design - L9 orthogonal array Experimental (L9) orthogonal array.

Step 4 - Analysis of Experimental Results Experiment no. Sand (G) Binder (B) Time (T)
• Invesgate the effect of process parameters on mold properes (Compression strength, Level GFN Level Wt. % of sand Level Hour(s)
Shear Strength, Core Hardness, Core Shrinkage) using main effect plots
1 1 40 1 1.6 1 1
Step 5 - Molding Sand Composion Opmizaon
2 1 60 2 2 2 2
• Construct the opmizaon model as a linear programming problem 3 1 60 3 2.4 3 4
• Solve for different weighng factors of parameters using Opmizer Solver 4 2 60 1 1.6 2 2
5 2 60 2 2 3 4
Step 6 - Verifying the Results
6 2 60 3 2.4 1 1
• Compare the results obtainded from opmizaon model with experiments. 7 3 80 1 1.6 3 4
8 3 80 2 2 1 4
9 3 80 3 2.4 2 2
Fig. 1. Process flow framework used for optimization.
 H. Khandelwal, B. Ravi / Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133 129

Fig. 2. Samples prepared for compression, shear, hardness, and shrinkage tests (left
to right).

shown in Fig. 4(a). For obtaining the hardness reading, the sharp
edge radius tipped plough of tester is pressed and pulled (up to
25 mm) against the surface of the sand mold. The shrinkage (dimen-
sional change) of the sand cores was measured using a dial indicator
Fig. 4. Hardness measurement with scratch tester (left) and shrinkage measure-
ment with a dial indicator setup (right).
Table 3
Mold properties for different experiment trials.

measurement, using a setup and protocol developed during a pre- Trial no. Compression Shear strength Core hardness Core shrinkage
vious investigation [9]. The fixture for core shrinkage is shown in strength CS SS (kg/cm2 ) CH (Number) SH (microns)
Fig. 4(b). The produced core specimens were placed in the fixture (kg/cm2 )

and the reading from the dial indicator was recorded in predefined 1 4.08 9.10 33 15.2
time interval. 2 7.56 13.10 57 33.0
3 16.16 17.20 83 45.5
The Taguchi approach predicts the effect of individual process
4 5.12 12.40 42 30.1
parameters by the main effect plot. ANOVA analysis was performed 5 10.31 13.64 64 63.5
to observe the significant effect of parameters. The Taguchi analy- 6 5.21 9.64 46 53.2
sis will give the optimum setting among the selected levels, which 7 5.30 11.61 40 52.1
can be treated as local optimum values. Therefore, additionally 8 4.20 9.40 37 57.1
9 7.21 11.20 51 80.6
an optimization model was developed in for global optimization
of all four responses (mold compression strength, shear strength,
core shrinkage and core hardness). The optimization function was found to be the most dominant parameter for mechanical proper-
designed to maximize compression strength, shear strength and ties. The sand grain fineness was found to be the most dominant
core hardness; and minimize the core shrinkage. The optimization parameter for core shrinkage.
problem was constructed as a linear programming problem and The phenomena can be explained in terms of the bonding and
solved to predict the optimum mold properties. Further the model curing mechanisms of chemically bonded mold. When the binder is
was verified by comparing the solver result with confirmation mixed with the silica sand, the mixing process allows a thin coating
experiments. of binders on individual sand particles. When the surfaces of two
binder coated sand particles come in close proximity, then they
3. Results and discussion crosslink with each other, and form a resin bridge. During curing,
these resin bridges shorten due to the evaporation of the solvent
The quality attributes of sand molds and cores measured in this present in binder, and result in hardening of the bridges. The cur-
work included compression strength, shear strength, hardness and ing generally takes about 24 h. To get a better insight in the curing
shrinkage. These properties were measured for all nine experimen- mechanism, the SEM analysis of a sample were carried out. The
tal conditions shown in Table 2 and are reported in Table 3. Their SEM images of samples (after 24 h curing) taken at two different
main effects are plotted in Fig. 5 to gain a better understanding. The locations are shown in Fig. 6. The images show the resign bridges
compression strength was found to decrease with finer sand and between two irregular shaped sand grains. The evidence of solvent
increase with binder content as well as curing time [Fig. 5(a)]. A evaporation and shortening of resin bridges was obtained in an
similar trend was observed in shear strength and hardness mea- earlier set of experiments [9], in which weight reduction of bare
surement, as shown in Fig. 5(b) and (c). The influence of sand chemical mixture with varying binder content was investigated.
grain size on core shrinkage was found to be the reverse of that The influence of molding composition on mold properties can
on mechanical properties [Fig. 5(d)]. The higher slop of the plots be explained in term of curing phenomenon. The effect of mold-
shows the significant effect of the individual parameters. Although ing parameters on compression strength, shear strength and core
all the parameters have significant influence, the curing time was hardness can be clearly observed from Fig. 5(a)–(c). An increase in

Fig. 3. Sand strength testing machine (left) for compression (middle) and shear (right).
130 H. Khandelwal, B. Ravi / Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133
Fig. 5. Main Effect Plot of mold properties.
grain fineness number of sand leads to more sand particles being
coated with the same amount of binder. This provides less strength
to the crosslink bond between two sand particles, resulting in lower
mechanical properties. The observation is in agreement with pre-
vious research [16]. As resin binder percentage increases, the same
number of sand particle are coated with more amount of binder,
which results in an increase in mechanical properties. Further, it
was observed that compression strength, shear strength and core
hardness increase with curing time. This occurs because curing
allows hardening of resin bridges between sand grains, providing
greater mechanical strength to the mold or core.
The effect of molding parameters on core shrinkage can be
clearly observed from Fig. 5(d). The influence of sand grain size
on core shrinkage was found to be the reverse of that on mechan-
ical properties [Fig. 5(d)]. The shrinkage phenomena of the core
is the result of shortening of the resin bridge due to evapora-
tion of solvent present in binders. This was also shown in earlier
research [9,21]. Core shrinkage increases with finer sand, because
more number of sand particles lead to more resin bridges, and these
shorten during curing, resulting in more shrinkage. The shrinkage
also increases with binder content and curing time. More amount
of binder leads to more volumetric reduction of resin bridges dur-
ing curing, thereby leading to increased shrinkage. Similarly, as
curing time increases, more solvent evaporates, leading to more
volumetric reduction of resin bridges and thereby more shrinkage.
The experimental results were used to obtain empirical relation-
ships between individual responses (compression strength, shear
strength, core hardness and core shrinkage) based on predictor
variables (sand grain size, binder content and curing time), through
general regression analysis performed using Minitab® V17 sta-
tistical software. Variance analyses (ANOVA) were performed to
investigate the significance of the parameters. The regression
model can determine how a response property changes when a
predictor variable changes. The equations were developed by least
square fitting, which is suitable for fitting data to a linear model. The
software uses the data obtained from the experiments (Table 2) to
develop these regression equations, which take the following form.
Response = constant + coffecient1 × predictor1 + · · · + coefficient
× predictorn
An empirical relationship of compression strength (in kg/cm2 )
of mold or core, based on sand grain size, binder content, and curing
time was obtained as follows:
CS = −3.67 − 0.09G + 5.87B + 2.02T (1)
here CS is compression strength, which acts as a response variable;
G, B and T are sand grain fineness number, percentage of binder con-
tent, and curing time, respectively, which act as predictor variables.
The predictor variables can be either continuous or categorical. The
predictive model is based on the sequential sum of squares analy-
sis. It was found that linear terms are sufficient for the compression
strength model (p < 0.05). The sequential F test in ANOVA indi-
cates statistically significant contribution of sand grain size, binder
 H. Khandelwal, B. Ravi / Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133
Fig. 6. SEM micrograph shows irregular sand grains bonded with alkyd resin.
content, and curing time in determining mold shrinkage. The stabil-
ity of the model fit was determined by R2 values, which indicate the
total deviation of the response variable from the predictive model.
The adjusted R2 is a measure of the amount of variation around
the mean. In this work, the value of the determination coefficient
R2 = 92%, represents only 8% of the total variation. The high value of
the adjusted R2 (adj. R2 = 87%) also confirms a high significance of
the predictor variable. Hence the predictive model of compression
strength has only linear terms as shown in Eq. (1). The higher coef-
ficient of binder content in the regression model exhibits a more
significant effect as compared to sand grain size and curing time.
The empirical relation between shear strength (in kg/cm2 ) as
response; and sand grain size, binder content and curing time as
predictor is given in the following equation:
SS = 7.91 − 0.06G + 2.05B + 1.50T
here SS is shear strength acting as the response variable. According
to the sequential sum of squares analysis (p < 0.05), the effect of
predictor variable was found to be significant. From the analysis
of variance, the determination coefficient (R2 = 84%) was found to
be high and adjusted determination coefficient (adj. R2 = 75%) was
also found to be high. This indicates a good statistical significance
of the model.
Similar equations were developed for core hardness (CH) and
shrinkage (SH), given in Eqs. (3) and (4). The R2 value of 95% for core
131
hardness and 94% for core shrinkage proves the stability of model
fit. These two models were also found to be statistically significant.
CH = 0.83 − 0.38G + 27.09B + 7.64T (3)
SH = −77.38 + 0.80G + 34.13B + 3.80T (4)
The above empirical relations can be used to estimate the prop-
erties of alkyd no-bake bonded molds and cores, for a given set of
values of sand grain size, binder content and curing time.
4. Optimization model and validation
To determine the optimal values of the above parameters,
an optimization model has been formulated. For this purpose,
an objective function was designed to maximize compression
strength, shear strength and hardness, and to minimize shrinkage.
The values of sand grain size, binder content and curing time are
varied within the limits described earlier. The objective function
and the constraints are mathematically represented as follows.
Objective function:
Maximize
f (X) = CS + SS + CH − SH (5)
Subject to
CS = f (G, B, T ) (6)
SS = f (G, B, T ) (7)
CH = f (G, B, T ) (8)
SH = f (G, B, T ) (9)
CH ≤ 100 (10)
SH ≤ 150 (11)
40 ≤ G ≤ 80 (12)
1.6 ≤ B ≤ 2.4 (13)
T ≤4 (14)
CS, SS, CH, SH and T are non − negative (15)
The constraints numbered 6, 7, 8 and 9 are represented by
regression equations 1, 2, 3 and 4, respectively. Constraint 10
implies that core hardness is measured on a scale of 0 to 100.
The maximum permissible shrinkage is taken as 150 microns (con-
straint 11). The last three constraints (12, 13 and 14) prescribe the
limits of grain fineness number, binder content and curing time.
Since the objective function as well as the constraints are linear,
we can consider this problem as a linear programming problem.
The optimization problem is modelled using AMPL (A Mathemati-
cal Programming Language), an algebraic modelling language. The
Gurobi Optimizer was employed to solve the problem. The opti-
mal solution for the above problem is given by: CS = 14.81 kg/cm2 ,
SS = 16.44 kg/cm2 , CH = 81.40 and SH = 51.75 ␮m, at G = 40 GFN,
B = 2.4% and T = 4 h. In this instance, equal importance was given
to all the responses and hence their coefficients in the objective
(2) function were kept as one. Since all four regression equations
cumulatively give a negative coefficient for GFN, the optimum solu-
tion for GFN takes the lower bound. In the case of binder and time,
the model gives a cumulative positive coefficient, so their solution
remains in the upper bound. The analytical solution of the model is
the same as the solution obtained from the optimizer. This approach
however, can work only for simple models. For problems with non-
equality constraints, the model cannot be solved analytically.
In practice, the four responses may have different levels of
importance. For example, the casting of a light weight precision part
may not require high values of mechanical properties of mold, but
132 H. Khandelwal, B. Ravi / Journal of Manufacturing Processes 22 (2016) 127–133

Table 4 5. Conclusion
Optimum values of process variables and responses.

Parameters/ Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 High quality molds, with the desired values of compression
responses (1,1,1,1) (1/2,1/2,1/2,1) (1/3,1/3,1/3,1) strength, shear strength, core hardness and shrinkage, are essential
(G) Grain fineness number 40 40 40 for producing near net shape castings. The experimental investi-
(GFN) gations enabled studying the effect of molding composition and
(B) Binder percentage (wt% 2.4 1.6 1.6 curing time on the above properties of chemically bonded sand
of sand)
molds. The mechanical properties of sand molds or cores were
(T) Curing time (h) 4 4 1
(CS) Compression strength 14.81 10.11 4.04 found to increase with binder content and curing time, but decrease
(kg/cm2 ) with sand grain fineness. The shrinkage of sand cores increased
(SS) Shear strength 16.44 14.80 10.30 with all three parameters (sand grain size, binder percentage, and
(kg/cm2 )
curing time). The results were explained in terms of binding and
(CH) Core hardness 81.40 59.74 36.81
(number) curing mechanism. The chain reaction of chemicals forms hard
(SH) Mold shrinkage (␮m) 51.78 24.49 13.07 resin bridges, found to be responsible for mechanical properties.
The evaporation of the solvent during curing was found to be
responsible for core shrinkage. Further, the crosslinking mecha-
its dimensional stability may be critical. In such cases, the responses nism of the core was analysed using SEM analysis. The optimum
can be provided appropriate weights, through their coefficients in mold properties were obtained at 2.4% binder, 40 GFN sand, and
the objective function, as given in Eq. (16). after 4 h of curing time, yielding the optimum compression strength
of 14.80 kg/cm2 , the optimum shear strength of 16.44 kg/cm2 , core
Maximize f (X) = w1 .CS + w2 .SS + w3 .CH − w4 .SH (16) hardness of 81.4 and mold shrinkage of 51 ␮m. The optimization
problem, modelled as multi-objective linear programming problem
here w1 , w2 , w3 and w4 are the weighting factors for compression
enabled obtaining the optimum mold properties for different sets
strength, shear strength, core hardness and mold shrinkage, respec-
of requirements. The model was successfully implemented for con-
tively. To illustrate further, three cases was designed with different
ducting experiments, showing good correlation between predicted
combination of weights indicated in brackets: case 1 (1,1,1,1), case 2
and observed values (less than 10% error). The model is expected
(1/2,1/2,1/2,1), and case 3 (1/3,1/3,1/3,1). The corresponding objec-
to be useful for industrial foundries to determine the appropriate
tive functions are given in Eqs. (17)–(19). The optimal solutions
values of molding parameters to achieve the desired values of mold
for the parameters and responses for these cases are reported in
properties. The work will help to optimize the molding parameters
Table 4. It can be seen that in all these cases, the optimal solu-
to obtain high dimensional accurate quality part.
tion for sand grain size takes the lower bound as 40 GFN. In case 2,
where less weightage is given to mechanical properties (compres-
sion strength, shear strength, core hardness), the model takes the Acknowledgements
lower bound of binder percentages. In case 3, the model takes the
lower bound for all three parameters. The results for the different This work was carried out in the E-Foundry lab, which was
cases are reported in Table 4. established with support from the National Knowledge Network
mission of the Government of India, New Delhi. The assistance of
f (X1) = CS + SS + CH–SH (17) Atul Kumar, Master of Science student in Industrial Engineering and
Operation Research at IIT Bombay is acknowledged in developing
1 1 1
f (X2) = CS + SS + CH–SH (18) the optimization model. Research associates K.H. Renukananda and
2 2 2
Amit Sata provided useful technical inputs and feedback.
1 1 1
f (X3) = CS + SS + CH − SH (19)
3 3 3
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