Aluminum Castings – Choosing the Technology
Aluminum castings can be produced in sand molds, permanent molds or by high-pressure die casting. Each of these technologies has its own "cost-effective range", determined by batch size, weight and shape of the casting, required accuracy and subsequent machining. The right choice lowers the cost of the entire order, while the wrong one raises it or reduces quality.
Which technology for which casting
| If… | …the best choice is usually |
|---|---|
| you need a prototype or a few pieces | sand mold casting |
| the casting is large or heavy (up to 100 kg at our foundry) | sand mold casting |
| the design may still change | sand casting – the pattern is easy to modify |
| the series runs to hundreds or thousands of pieces, and the casting weighs up to 50 kg | permanent mold casting |
| high strength is required after T6 heat treatment | permanent mold or sand casting |
| the series runs to many thousands of pieces per year, and the walls are thin | die casting |
| ±0.1 mm accuracy matters without machining | die casting |
The boundaries are not sharp. The same part may start out as a sand casting and, once the design has stabilized and orders grow, be moved to permanent mold or high-pressure die casting.
Questions that help you decide
- How many pieces do you need now, and how many per year in the following years?
- What are the weight and the largest dimension of the casting?
- Which surfaces must be accurate, and will they be machined?
- Must the casting be pressure-tight, weldable or heat-treatable?
- What finish does it require – powder coating, polishing?
Tooling cost vs. unit price
A pattern for sand molds is the cheapest and fastest to make, but every mold is made from scratch, so the cost per piece is higher. A permanent mold and a die-casting die require a larger investment, but in large series they lower the unit price and improve repeatability. We make the tooling – patterns, permanent molds and die-casting dies – in our own pattern shop and tool room (for some projects, with trusted partners), usually within a few days to a few weeks.
In short: sand castings are chosen for prototypes, short runs and large castings; permanent mold castings for medium and large series of castings up to 50 kg, also in the T6 condition; high-pressure die castings for large series of thin-walled, precise castings.
See also: sand castings, aluminum permanent mold castings, aluminum die castings i sand casting or permanent mold casting.
Not sure which process to choose? Send a drawing or 3D model to odlewnia@adjatech.pl or call: +48 61 662 43 37 (Mon–Fri 8:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m.).
Scope of services: foundry production capabilities.