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Some success (finally) with lost resin investment casting

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Mcgyver:
I finally had some success with lost resin investment casting.  This is like lost wax investment casting, however the pattern instead of being was is a special castable 3D printing resin.


Been at it for 2 years, each attempt takes so much time and there as so many variables; what resin, what printer exposure settings, what curing process, what metal, what burnout, what investment, what mixture etc etc.  Very tedious and lots of blind alleys.  But on the weekend, success!


The main subject is the reversing handwheel for a Stuart Triple Expansion Marine Engine.  The one on the drawings never really appealed, so I had an idea for a cast hand wheel with spokes.






Two years of heartbreaking attempts (each one takes Friday - Sunday and is a lot of effort).  I'd get close, but too many surface flaws.   I can do a perfect lost wax casting, but the resin behaves differently.  The burn out (I think) expands it slightly damaging the mold, so I switch to "Plasticast" which is supposed to tougher.  Still endless problems, and with so many variables (and a lack of experience) its challenging to sort it all out.













That is a lot of attempts!!


I tried a new resin on the weekend,  X-one resin which is not cured with UV light.




Keep your fingers crossed




Well, finally! They didn't all turn out great but one did and the results are better than anything so far.  Most of the rest suffered from ( I realized after) a poor tree layout.  It is being vacuum cast, but there are limits to how much it will run up hill.  This is using 873 silicon bronze (no zinc!)





No major surface flaws




after a bit of pickling




This is enlarged quite a bit, its just over an inch in diameter so I think I can live with the few flaws there are.


As an experiment I also took some model flange fittings I'd been working on and made assemblies out of them using fake nuts and bolts.   The idea is if you silver soldered a piece of tube to it, it would look like a bolted flange connection.  This one is for 1/4" tubing.





Check out how the fake threads even came through - It gives a good idea of the resolution and detail you can get with the resin printers. Those fake bolts are .060" diameter. There is a new league if super fine printers that can print to two microns.....but they are >$200,000 so my $290 one will have to do for now!
















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tghs:
 :whoohoo: :whoohoo: looking very good

Keith1500:
Nice resolution. For $290 printer I would be happy with that. What’s the printer that you are using?

Mcgyver:
Thanks Gents,

Keith its an Anycubic Photon mono 4k.  Fairly high resolution (about equivalent to 700 dpi) but a small work envelope.  The 4k is the product of matrix length and width, so a 4k with small work envelope gives the highest resolution, vs a 4k with a bigger work envelope.  The printer is $232 US now. (my 290 was CDN)}

Kim:
That is really slick!  You really stuck with it to get your lost-resin casting method to work.  Well done!  :ThumbsUp: :popcorn:

And the elbow flange fittings look really great!  Those would do any model proud :)

Kim

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