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In order to produce cast components, which meet the quality requirements of the automotive and aerospace industries, the control of liquid metal quality prior to the casting process is essential. Rotary degassing is the most commonly used melt treatment method in the foundry industry, which can effectively reduce the inclusion and solute hydrogen content of the metal. This procedure is often combined with fluxing, which allows more efficient inclusion removal during melt processing. In this study, the effects of rotary degassing treatments executed with and without flux addition on the melt cleanliness were compared. The quality of the molten metal was characterized by the microscopic inspection of K-mold specimens, X-ray computed tomography of reduced pressure test samples, and by Density-Index evaluation. The inclusions found on the fracture surfaces of K-mold samples were analyzed with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. Based on the results, rotary degassing coupled with flux addition can be an effective inclusion and solute hydrogen removal technique that can significantly improve melt quality. On the other hand, rotary degassing executed without flux addition can increase the inclusion content of the melts. This can be attributed to the chemical reaction between the liquid alloy and the N 2 purging gas during the degassing process. It was also found that inclusion content highly influences the tendency to porosity formation.

The presence of inclusions such as oxides, carbides or refractory particles can be harmful to the mechanical and surface characteristics of castings. Inclusion-rich metals result in lower fluidity and feeding capability during casting. Nowadays, solid fluxes are widely used in foundries in order to reduce the inclusion content of aluminium melts. In this study, the effect of four different fluxes on the melt quality was studied. First, the inclusion content of the flux-treated melt, and then the properties of the fluxes (i.e. chemical composition and melting temperature) were examined.

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Rotary degassing is one of the most frequently used melt treatment technologies used for processing liquid aluminum alloys. Despite this, the information available about the possible effects of this method on the double oxide- and nitride film (bifilm) content, especially when using different purging gases, is quite limited. For this reason, in this study, the effects of multiple rotary degassing treatments conducted with N2 and Ar purging gases on the bifilm quantity of a casting aluminum alloy were compared. The characterization of the melt quality was realized by the computed tomographic (CT) analysis of reduced pressure test (RPT) specimens, image analysis, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) of the fracture surfaces of K-mold samples. Based on the results, by the application of Ar as a purging gas, relatively low bifilm content can be achieved. On the other hand, while the use of N2 leads to the formation of numerous small-sized nitride bifilms, which significantly increased the pore number density inside the RPT specimens. This can be associated with the nitride formation by the chemical reaction between the liquid aluminum alloy and the N2 purging gas bubbles during the degassing treatments. Graphical abstract

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The quality of chemically bonded sand cores used during the manufacturing process of cast components is highly dependent on the properties of the sand, which constitutes the refractory base media of the core. One of the main advantages of the application of different types of sands as molding aggregates that after casting, they can be reclaimed and can be used again during core shooting. The properties of the sand, however, could be remarkably changed during the casting and reclamation processes. This study aims to investigate the effects of the properties of the base sand on the mechanical strength and thermal distortion properties of samples made from new and thermally reclaimed silica sand. For this purpose, particle size analysis, specific surface area, and loss on ignition measurements, as well as differential thermal analysis coupled with thermogravimetry, were executed on the base sands, and the sand grains were analyzed with scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction. Test pieces were made with hot box and cold box technology for bending and hot distortion tests. It was found that by the utilization of reclaimed sand, cores with higher average bending strength and lower thermal deformation can be produced. These differences can be traced back to the more advantageous granulometric properties, lower impurity content, and lower thermal expansion of thermally reclaimed sand.

Porosity plays an important role in the properties of powder metallurgy products and castings. Nowadays, there are several methods for determining porosity: optical microscopy, computed tomography, and density measurement according to Archimedes’ principle. The aim of this study is to present the advantages and disadvantages of different porosity testing methods and the relationships between the results. With conventional metallographic methods, only two-dimensional information about pores is obtained. The accuracy of a three-dimensional CT examination is significantly affected by the resolution, the quality of the image, and the evaluation process. The porosities of aluminum (AlSi7MgCu0.5) reduced pressure test samples with different densities were determined on 3D x-ray images with the evaluation software VGStudio MAX 3.3 and on 2D section x-ray images and the optical microscope images with the image analysis software ImageJ. The effect of morphological transformation of 3D images and the role of the region of interest volume and area under examination are also discussed.