Optimization of Molding Sand Composition for Casting Al Alloy

In the aluminum casting industry, the foundry manufacturers find the quality of the sand mold as important fact to achieve high quality aluminum castings. The aim of this research is to reduce aluminum casting defects by optimizing proportion of water and bentonite added to a recycled sand mold. Aluminum 356 alloy was preferred for this research based on the traditional method of trial and error twelve castings were performed with the different proportion of sand, bentonite, and water. A five scale rating method has been applied to rate the casted product upon number of defects. This research has been carried out by analyzing the variance (ANOVA) by using Minitab 17.0 software and finally concludes with the optimum level of composition for casting Al with the result of 90% sand, 5% bentonite, and 5% water.