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Design And Fabrication Of A Mini Metal Foundry

Electrical Electronics Engineering | Engineering

The design and fabrication of a mini metal foundry involves the creation of a compact and efficient system for melting metals such as aluminum, bronze, or copper for small-scale casting projects. Typically, this process requires constructing a furnace capable of reaching high temperatures, often utilizing materials like refractory bricks, ceramic fiber insulation, and a propane burner for heat generation. The design must ensure proper insulation to contain the heat efficiently while allowing for controlled airflow and combustion. Fabrication involves assembling the furnace components, such as the crucible, furnace body, lid, and burner assembly, with attention to detail to ensure safety and functionality. Moreover, integrating temperature regulation mechanisms and safety features enhances the usability and reliability of the foundry. Through meticulous design and precise fabrication, a mini metal foundry can provide enthusiasts, hobbyists, and small-scale artisans with a cost-effective and accessible means of melting and casting metals for various creative and practical applications.

ABSTRACT

In a survival situation, tools and weapons made from stone, bone, or wood will suffice but those same tools and weapons constructed from metal may prove overwhelmingly useful. However, metal construction requires use of a forge or foundry, a special furnace used to generate extreme heat – enough to melt (a foundry) or soften (a forge) metal.

With a foundry, any metal can be melted but aluminum is the easiest to melt. Aluminum can be obtained from cans, foil, or car parts such as automobile pistons. If the rods are still attached to the pistons, the piston can still be melted and the rod fished out of the foundry before it begins to soften. Brass is also a popular material to melt.

CHAPTER ONE

1.1 INTRODUCTION

Our lives are filled with cast metal products. Many of the metal objects we take for granted – train wheels, trailer hitches, lamp posts, large scale industrial equipment, and even sculpture – are cast in a foundry. The sheer number of different applications for cast metal demonstrates its versatility: metal can be cast into durable, complex metal components with minimal machining or welding, thereby decreasing the need for expensive labor. More importantly, metal casting foundries have become a significant user of recycled scrap metal, taking obsolete metal objects and transforming them into useful products.

A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal in a mold, and removing the mold material or casting after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals processed are aluminium and cast iron. However, other metals, such as bronze, brass, steel, magnesium, and zinc, are also used to produce castings in foundries. In this process, parts of desired shapes and sizes can be formed.

In metalworking, metal foundry involves pouring liquid metal into a mold, which contains a hollow cavity of the desired shape, and then allowing it to cool and solidify. The solidified part is also known as a casting, which is ejected or broken out of the mold to complete the process. Foundry is most often used for making complex shapes that would be difficult or uneconomical to make by other methods.

1.2 AIM OF THE STUDY

There are many different types of foundry, but the main aim of the project is to design a mini metal foundry.

1.3 OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

At the end of this work students involved will be able:

Know how to design mini metal foundry
Learn different procedures of making metal foundry
The process of molding metal
Mold different shapes of iron.

1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

This study gives knowledge of cast iron manufacturing and takes appropriate decisions to adapt cast iron manufacturing system improving its robustness.

The ability to use various smaller furnaces for comparable productivity, faster melting, easier and more reliable chemistry adjustments, less oxidation of the melt, less manpower and much improved charging safety is significant.

This can help us to the prediction of local structures, phases and ultimately the local mechanical properties and real geometrical dimensions of cast irons pieces, to asses casting quality in the foundry. Actual systems are not able to control processes according to this demand because they are not able to account for the complexity of foundry processes in all respects.

1.5 APPLICATION OF THE STUDY

The metal foundry industry produces cast parts for automotive, agriculture, heavy truck, material handling, power transmission, off-highway vehicles, etc. (in transportation, energy, aerospace, and manufacturing industry, 90% of the manufactured products have cast iron parts).

1.6 ADVANTAGES OF THE STUDY

Molten metal flows into small ant section in the molten cavity. Hence any complex shape can be easily produced.
Practically any material can be casted.
Ideal method is by producing small quantities
Due to small cooling rate from all directions, the properties of casting are same in all directions.
Any size of foundry can be produced up to 200 tons.
Foundry is the often cheapest and most direct way of producing a shape with certain desired mechanical properties.
Certain metals and alloys such as highly creep resistant metal-based alloys for gas turbines cannot be worked mechanically and can be cast only.
Heavy equipment like machine leads, ship’s propeller, etc. can be thrown easily in the required size rather than fabricating them by joining several small pieces.
Foundry is best suited for composite components requiring different properties in various direction. These are made by incorporating preferable inserts in a casting. For example, aluminum conductors into slots in iron armature for electric motors, wear resistant skins onto shock resistant components.

1.7 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

With normal sand casting process, the dimensional accuracies and surface finish is less.
Defects are unavoidable.
Metal foundry is labor intensive.