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The 3d-printed core assembled inside the female tools from which the "soft" plaster mold foundry tools are produced. The female tools represent the actual plaster molds that are produced from the working foundry tools.
Sycast's Hybrid Mold Solution:
- To minimize Tooling Cost, to produce the exterior cast surfaces, Sycast designed plaster molds that are generated from rigid, "soft" Foundry Tools, inexpensive plastic/urethane tools specifically designed for the Plaster Mold Casting process. The plaster mold exterior also produces a smooth exterior, as if the cylinder head had been cast in expensive Permanent Mold Tooling.
- Sycast designed the internal water passageways (aka the "waterjacket) and other internal delicate cores to be produced by Tool-less Sand Casting. An additive fabrication process, this allowed the waterjacket sand core to be produced as a single sand piece, instead of a glued assembly, with perfect sand compaction everywhere. The result of the 3d-printed sand core(s), there were no weaknesses in the sand for molten aluminum to bridge across during the casting process. This Tool-less approach had the added benefit of eliminating the need to produce costly, complex foundry tooling for the waterjacket core.
- Sycast CAD-engineered steel mold inserts to line the fireface of cylinderhead casting. These steel inserts were precision CNC-machined and designed to be assembled into the plaster mold AFTER the molding operation, during the hybrid mold assembly from a build sheet. The benefit - the steel inserts provided a chillcast solution along the fireface, locally creating the same metallurgy as a cylinder head that was cast in permanent mold foundry tools.
The 3d-printed core assembled inside the female tools from which the "soft" plaster mold foundry tools are produced. The female tools represent the actual plaster molds that are produced from the working foundry tools.
The resultant cylinder head casting using Hybrid Mold Technology, produced entirely using Tool-less Casting technologies and Soft Plaster Mold Tools and Steel Inserts.
3D-Printed Sand Core (a Tool-less technology) that produces the internal water passages (aka the "waterjacket) for the Lotus Twincam cylinder head.
When Sycast's engineering team was approached to manufacture a limited run of reproduction Lotus Twincam cylinder heads, the customer's project goals were considerable:
Maintain a minimum Tooling Cost because the projected product life was only 100 castings.
Eliminate casting "flash" in the cylinder head waterjacket, a common problem with the original cylinder heads
The final product should appear vintage and replicate critical properties of the original cylinder head:
- Smooth exterior cast surface
- Excellent metallurgy on the cylinder head's "fire face" wall.
- Smooth exterior cast surface
Case Study: Hybrid Mold Technology
Reproduction Lotus Twincam Cylinder Head
Sycast Inc.
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