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Offshore Sand Casting

Offshore Sand Casting

Barron Industries is a turnkey foundry with a long tradition of delivering high-quality castings. To meet our customers’ varying quantity needs, we’ve partnered with a reliable offshore sand casting partner in India.

Prototype, low-volume, and gap sand casting production are handled from our plant in Michigan. As volumes increase, we can offer large-quantity production from our offshore partner to help you lower costs. Every casting is received into and inspected at our U.S.-based facility to ensure it meets our quality standards. Additionally, we have a policy of holding several weeks’ inventory on-site as a safeguard against any supply chain disruptions.

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Capabilities

Our offshore sand casting services cover most grades of steel, stainless steel, and aluminum, and adhere to ISO 9001 standards to ensure quality. The maximum casting weight is 600 kg/1,320 lbs. Additional services include CNC machining, coating, and testing.

Hot metal being poured into a cast

Benefits

Sand casting is an expendable mold process that uses inexpensive patterns to create the mold cavity, resulting in lower tooling costs while allowing for short-notice tool modifications.

Other benefits include:

  • Lower lead time
  • Compatibility with a wide range of alloys
  • Can produce complex shapes, especially with regard to internal features formed by sand cores
  • Can hold moderately tight tolerances, producing wall thickness of 1/4” in steel and 1/8” in aluminum.
CNC machine

The Process

  1. The process starts with creating sand molds. Sand molds are made by packing sand in a box(the drag) around a pattern.
  2. The pattern is lifted out to leave an open cavity at the top. This cavity is then covered by a second sand-filled box called the cope, which may also have a matching cavity formed by a pattern.
  3. The two boxes are assembled, creating a flask containing a void for molten metal to fill. Additional passages in the cope and drag provide channels for the metal to flow through. The sand itself is held together with a binder, such as bentonite clay or resin sand.
  4. Cores may be placed in the sand mold to create hollow regions. Because these cores are made of sand, they can be broken up once the metal has solidified and the part has been released from the flask.
  5. Then, the mold is filled with metal. This stage is possibly the most challenging to optimize. If the mold is filled too fast, there’s a risk of turbulence, creating defects like porosity. If the mold is filled too slowly, the metal will start to solidify before the cavity is full. Linked to this is the challenge of managing shrinkage so the casting doesn’t tear before it’s “frozen.”
  6. The cast is removed from the mold after the metal has cooled and solidified. Any potential finishing processes, like heat treating or surface coating, will follow.

Superior Investment Casting Solutions™

Speak to one of our experts today to learn more about our custom casting solutions.

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