Lost foam casting is a kind of precision casting process, also known as gasification mold casting, solid mold casting, and cavityless casting. The dimensional accuracy of this process is as high as 0.2mm, and the surface roughness can reach Ra5μm～Ra6μm. It is praised by the foundry industry as "New Casting Technology in the 21st Century" and "Green Project of Casting".

The lost foam casting process is simply to use fusible materials to make a model that can be melted and disappeared. After the model is vaporized at a high temperature, molten metal is poured into it, and the shell is removed after cooling to obtain a casting.

With the rapid development of 3D printing technology, combined with the application of computer technology, three-dimensional product design drawings can be directly imported into the equipment, and casting prototypes can be directly obtained, which can be used to replace traditional wax models. From the structure design and process formulation of precision castings to the design and manufacture of pressure forms, and wax mold forming have brought great changes to the production of precision castings.

The editor today is sharing the application of 3D printing light curing (SLA) rapid precision casting


Traditional precision casting adopts the method of opening molds and pressing wax molds. The wax molds require molds. The production of small batches of complex parts is faced with the problems of high cost, long cycle time, and difficulty in repeated design verification. These problems will be changed by using 3D printing rapid precision casting to realize the rapid production of castings.

What is SLA3D printing rapid precision casting?

SLA (Stereo Lithography Appearance) is a 3D printing process with higher accuracy and better molding quality. The use of SLA light-curing 3D printing technology to directly print resin molds instead of traditional casting wax molds for casting production can save The dewaxing mold opening process is a rapid prototyping technology that can meet the casting industry's requirements for accuracy and surface quality at the same time. It has a high success rate and is more environmentally friendly.

SLA light curing 3D printing technology principle:

Using UV ultraviolet rays as the light source and liquid photosensitive resin as the raw material, under the control of the computer, it is printed and accumulated layer by layer according to the cross-sectional data of the three-dimensional graphics. The light-curing prototype used for precision casting must be made into a hollow shape. After printing and molding, the uncured resin is poured out, the hollow shape is formed, the resin discharge port is sealed, and then the wax casting system is installed to make the shell. The wall thickness of the evacuated prototype can be made into a 0.6mm flake state, which evaporates and vaporizes during firing, and can be completely free of impurities. It is an ideal casting production process, suitable for high-strength, large-size and high-precision parts casting production.