Investigation of dimension accuracy formation in casting patterns carried out by method of additive technologies for foundry

Abstract

The results of investigations on the use of additive technologies for manufacturing geometrically complex patterns in foundry technology are presented. The purpose of this work is the investigation of possibility to use as pattern materials – PLA and ABS plastic according to the technology of the layer-by-layer application of melted pattern material through an extruder. In the paper there is considered an alternative method which consists in printing basic units on a 3D printer with subsequent manufacturing patterns made of them for casts. For 3D pattern conversion into a set of instructions for the motion of a printing head there was used Replicator G (free software). The parameters of dimension accuracy and a rate of pattern material burning were investigated inasmuch as a slow gasification can result in unsatisfactory filling of a mold with melt and as a consequence in the defect formation in a subsequent cast because gas dissolution in metal.