A study of ceramic core for geometrically complex investment casting

In the recent time, the demand of complex castings is continuously increasing specially in the field of aerospace, automobile, medical, food industries machinery and machine tool. Investment casting being the most traditional manufacturing process is always the most preferred route for producing complex shape near-net parts. In many complex parts, making the undercuts, channels or passage are the most critical and challenging activity. For such complicated castings, cores are used in preparing the investment molds. In practice, sand core, soluble wax core, urea core, salt core, and ceramic material-based cores are typically used in foundry industry. Among these ceramic gives the best properties compared to any other core materials. Currently varieties of ceramic cores are used in investment casting for different metal and alloys. The properties of final cast part significantly affect by the properties of ceramic core, which directly depends on the various core-composition. Many researchers have made and tested cores with various ceramic compositions; however no published research was found which summarizes them in scientifically. This paper presents a study on various ceramic compositions being used in Investment Casting. The article will be helpful for foundry men in selecting the appropriate composition of ceramic core material based on the part specific requirements.