Chapter : 9

Cleaning, Fettling, Finishing, and

Heat treatment of Castings

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Chapter Outlines
 Cleaning castings
 Fettling of castings( knocking of dry sand, removal of
gates and risers, removal of fins and un wanted
projections)
 Finishing castings
 Heat treatment of castings
 Heat treatment fundamentals
 Annealing of castings
 Normalizing castings
 Hardening of castings
 Tempering castings
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 Introduction
• Casting is taken out of the mould by shaking and the moulding sand is
recycled often with suitable additions.
• After the casting is removed from the mould it is thoroughly cleaned
and the excess material usually along the parting line and the place
where the molten metal was poured, is removed using a potable grinder.
• The remaining sand, some of which may be embedded in the casting, is
removed by means of shot blasting.
• The excess material in the form of sprue, runners, gates etc., along with
the flashes formed due to flow of molten metal into the gaps is broken
manually in case of brittle casting or removed by sawing and grinding
in case of ductile material.
• The entire casting is then cleaned by either shot blasting or chemical
pickling.
• Sometimes castings are heat treated to achieve better mechanical
properties.
• White light inspection, pressure test, magnetic particle inspection,
radiographic test, ultrasonic inspection etc. are used for inspection of
the cast products.
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Cleaning
• It is carried out after the metal has solidified and cool in the mold.
• These molds go to a shake out station where the sand and casting are
dumped from the flask.
• The casting are shaken free from the molding and some dry sand
cores are knocked out.
• This process of shake out is called the cleaning of castings.
• Actually shake out is done by two methods, manually or
mechanically.
• Generally mechanical shake out are used for large scale work.
• This unit consists of heavy mesh screen fixed to a vibrating frame.
• The screen vibrate mechanically and quick separation of sand from
other parts.
• The manually work is done for small castings.
• In this work the stationary gratings are mounted and molds are break
by dropping the molds over gratings.
• After that the sand is return to the storage bin , flasks are sent to the
molding sections and castings (production) go to the cleaning
department for fettling.
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 Fettling
• The complete process of cleaning of castings called
fettling.
• It involves the removal of the cores, gates, sprues, runners,
risers and chipping of any of unnecessary projections on
the surface of the castings.
• The fettling operation may be divided in to different stages.
 Knocking out of dry sand cores:
• Dry sand cores may be removed by knocking with iron bar.
• For quick knocking pneumatic or hydraulic devices are
employed, this method is used for small, medium work. For
large castings the hydro blast process is mostly employed.
 Removal of gates and risers:
• Gates and risers can be removed from casting by several
methods depending upon size and metal used.
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 Cont’d
• With chipping hammer. It is particularly suited in case of
grey iron castings and brittle materials.
• The gates and risers can easily be broken by hitting the
hammer.
• With cutting saw. These saws may be hand saw and
power saw are used for cutting the ferrous like steel,
malleable iron and for non ferrous materials.
• Mostly the hand saws are used for small and medium but
when power and used for large work.
• With flame cutting. This type of method is specially used
for ferrous materials of large sized castings where the
risers and gates are very heavy.
• In this the gas cutting flames and arc cutting methods may
be employed .(it is not applicable for small castings.)
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 Cont’d
• With abrasive cut of machine. These machines can work
with all metals but are specially designed for hard metals
which can not saw or sheared also where flame cutting and
chipping is not feasible.
• It is more expensive than other methods.
 Removal of fins, rough spots and un wanted projections.
The casting surface after removal of the gates may still contain
some rough surfaces left at the time of removal of gates.
• Sand that is fused with surface.
• Some fins and other projections on the surface near the parting
line.
• The need to be cleaned thoroughly before the casting is put to
use.
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 Cont’d
• The fins and other small projections may easily be chipped off
with the help of either hand tools or pneumatic tools.
• But for smoothing the rough cut gate edges either the pedestal or
swing frame grinder is used depends upon the size of castings.
• For cleaning the sand particles sticking to the casting surface sand
blasting is normally used.
• An other use full method for cleaning the casting surface is the
tumbling.
• This is an oldest machine method for cleaning the casting surfaces.
• In this method the castings are put in large sheet shell or barrel
along with the castings and small piece of white cast iron called
stars.
• The barrel is supported on horizontal turnions and is related at the
speed varying from 25-30rpm for 15-30 minutes.
• It causing the castings to tumble over to another, rubbing against
the castings.
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Finishing
 A range of finishing processes is usually undertaken.
These include:
• Cleaning to remove residual sand, oxides and surface
scale, often by shot or tumble blasting;
• Heat treatment, including annealing, tempering,
normalising and quenching (in water or oil) to enhance
mechanical properties;
• Removal of excess metal or surface blemishes, (e.g.,
flash resulting from incomplete mould closure or burrs
left from riser cut-off), by grinding, sawing or arc air
(oxy-propane cutting);
• Rectification of defects by welding; Machining;
• Non destructive testing to check for defects;
• Painting or application of a rust preventative coating.
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Heat Treatment of castings
• Introduction:
• Alloying and heat treatment are two methods which are
extensively used for controlling material properties.
• Heat treatment is an operation or combination of operations
involving heating at a specific rate, soaking at a temperature
for a period of time and cooling at some specified rate.
• The aim is to obtain a desired microstructure to achieve
certain predetermined properties (physical, mechanical,
magnetic or electrical).
• Heat Treatment is often associated with increasing the
strength of material, but it can also be used to alter certain
manufacturability objectives such as improve machining,
improve formability, restore ductility after a cold working
operation, casting, welding etc. Thus it is a very enabling
manufacturing process that can not only help other
manufacturing process, but can also improve product
performance by increasing strength or other desirable
characteristics. 10
 Objectives of heat treatment (heat treatment
processes)
The major objectives are :
• To increase strength, harness and wear resistance
(bulk hardening, surface hardening);
• To increase ductility and softness (tempering,
recrystallization annealing);
• To increase toughness (tempering, recrystallization
annealing);
• To obtain fine grain size (recrystallization annealing,
full annealing, normalising);
• To remove internal stresses induced by differential
deformation by cold working, non-uniform cooling
from high temperature during casting and welding
(stress relief annealing); 11
 Cont’d
• To improve cutting properties of tool steels
(hardening and tempering);
• To improve surface properties (surface hardening,
corrosion resistance-stabilising treatment and high
temperature resistance-precipitation hardening,
surface treatment);
• To improve electrical properties (recrystallization,
tempering, age hardening);
• To improve magnetic properties (hardening, phase
transformation).
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 STAGES OF HEAT TREATMENT
Heat treating is accomplished in three major
stages:
 Stage l—Heating the metal slowly to ensure a
uniform temperature
 Stage 2—Soaking (holding) the metal at a
given temperature for a given time
 Stage 3—Cooling the metal to room
temperature

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Types of Heat Treatment Processes

• Annealing;
• Normalizing;
• Hardening;
• Tempering;
• Surface Hardening.

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 1. Annealing:
Annealing is defined as heating the steel to
austenite phase (8200C-8500C) and then cooling
it slowly inside furnace.
 Steel is annealed to one of the following
purposes:
• To reduce hardness;
• To relieve internal stress;
• To facilitate cold working by restoring ductility;
• To improve mechanical, physical and other;
properties.
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Cont’d
• To remove residual stresses,
• To improve toughness,
• To alter various mechanical, electrical or
magnetic properties of material through
refinement of grains.
Process is carried out in a controlled
atmosphere of inert gas to avoid oxidation.
• Used to achieve ductility in work hardened
steels.
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Cont’d
Annealing temperature:
Types of steel Annealing temperature (0C)
Hypo-eutectoid AC3+50
Hyper-eutectoid AC1+50

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2. Normalizing
• The process is similar to annealing and is carried
out to avoid excessive softness in the material.
• Normalizing is defined as heating the steel to
austenite phase(900°C – 925°C) and cooling it in
air.
• This gives relatively faster cooing and hence
enhanced hardness and less ductility.
• Normalizing is less expensive than annealing.
• In normalization variation in properties of
different sections of a part is achieved.
• The selection of heat treatment operations is
strongly influenced by the carbon content in the
steel.
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Cont’d
 It is done to achieve the following purposes
i. To eliminate course grained structure obtained
in operations like forging & rolling
ii.To improve machinability of low carbon steels
iii. To maintain uniform microstructure through
out the wok piece

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Cont’d
Normalizing Temperature (°c)
Hypo-eutectoid steels AC3+50
Hyper-eutectoid steels ACm+50

 The process might be more accurately described

as a homogenizing or grain-refining treatment.

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 3. Hardening
• Hardening is performed to impart strength and hardness to
alloys by heating up to a certain temperature, depending on
the material, and cooling it rapidly.
• Steel is heated and held there until its carbon is dissolved,
and then cooled rapidly.
• The carbon does not get sufficient time to escape and get
dissipated in the lattice structure. This helps in locking the
dislocation movements when stresses are applied.
• Quenching is performed to cool hot metal rapidly by
immersing it in brine (salt water),water, oil, molten salt, air
or gas.
• Quenching sets up residual stresses in the work piece and
sometimes results in cracks.
• Residual stresses are removed by another process called
annealing.
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Cont’d
 Hardening is defined as rapidly cooling of
steel from austenite phase.
 Steel is quenched in water or brine for the
most rapid cooling, in oil for some alloy steels,
and in air for certain higher alloy steels.
 With this fast cooling rate, the transformation
from austenite to pearlite cannot occur and the
new phase obtained by quenching is called
martensite.

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Cont’d
 To harden steel, the metal is cooled rapidly
after thoroughly soaking it at a temperature
slightly above its upper critical point.
 Hardening increases the hardness and strength
of the steel, but makes it less ductile.
Generally, the harder the steel, the more brittle
it becomes.
 To remove some of the brittleness, steel should
be tempered after hardening process.
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 Cont’d

The hardening treatment for most steels consists of heating

the steel to a set temperature and then cooling it rapidly by
plunging it into oil, water, or brine
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4. Tempering
 In this process, the steel is heated to lower critical
temperature (350--400°C) keeping it there for
about one hour and then cooled slowly at
prescribed rate.
 Tempering is the process of reheating hardened
(martensitic) or normalized steels to some
temperature below the lower critical (AC1).
 The purpose of tempering is to reduce the
brittleness imparted by hardening and to produce
definite physical properties within the steel.
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Cont’d
Martensite is very hard and brittle.
Tempering is applied to hardened steel to:
• Reduce brittleness,
• Increase ductility,
• Increase toughness, and
• Relieve stresses in martensite structure.
• This process increases ductility and toughness but
also reduces hardness, strength and wear
resistance marginally.
• Increase in tempering temperature lowers the
hardness.
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Case (Surface) Hardening of Steels
 Surface hardening is a process for obtaining
desired characteristics on the exterior of a steel
component.
 Why Surface Hardening?
a. To improve wear resistance;
b. To improve resistance to high contact stresses;
c. To improve fracture toughness;
d. To improve fatigue resistance, and, sometimes,
e. To improve corrosion resistance.

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 Cont’d
Components usually surface-hardened
 gears
 valves
 bearings
 shafts
Types of Surface Hardening process
1. Carburizing;
2. Nitriding;
3. Cyaniding;
4. Flame hardening;
5. Induction hardening.
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Cont’d
1. Carburizing
 A process of adding carbon to the surface of steels.
This is done by exposing the part to a carbon-rich
atmosphere at an elevated temperature and allowing
diffusion to transfer the carbon atoms into steel.
 Types of Carburizing:
- Pack carburizing - Vacuum carburizing
- Gas carburizing - Liquid carburizing
 Carbon content achieved: 0.7 to 1.2 wt.%
 Suitable for: Low-carbon steels and alloy steels
containing 0.08 to 0.2 wt.%C.
 Carburizing temperature: 850-950 °C (1550-1750
°F) Carburizing Time: 4 to 72 h.
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Cont’d
2. Nitriding
 A process of diffusing nitrogen into the surface of steel.
The nitrogen forms nitrides with elements such as
aluminum, chromium, molybdenum, and vanadium.
 The parts are heat treated and tempered before
nitriding.
 Suitable for: Low carbon alloy steels containing Al, Cr,
Mo, V, Ni
 Nitriding temperature: 500-600 °C (subcritical, below
A1).
 Mechanism: NH3→N+3H
 Surface hardness achieved: up to 1000 VHN Case
Depth: 0.1 to 0. 6 mm
 Applications: Gears, valves, cutters, sprockets, tools,
fuel-injection pump parts. 30
Cont’d
3. CYANIDING
 This process is a type of case hardening that is
fast and efficient. Preheated steel is dipped into a
heated cyanide bath and heated to 1600 -1750 0C
and allowed to soak.
 Upon removal, it is quenched and then rinsed to
remove any residual cyanide.
 This process produces a thin, hard shell (between
0.010 and 0.030 inches) that is harder than the one
produced by carburizing and can be completed in
20 to 30 minutes.
 The major drawback is that cyanide salts are a
deadly poison.
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End of Chapter

Thanks!
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