Relatively cold die material comes into contact with the substantially higher temperature melt during the casting cycle, causing high thermal fluctuations resulting into the cyclic change of thermal field. The presented contribution is devoted to the assessment of the impact of temperature distribution on individual zones in the die volume. The evaluated parameter is the die temperature. It was monitored at two selected locations with the 1 mm, 2 mm, 5 mm, 10 mm and 20 mm spacing from the die cavity surface to the volume of cover die and ejector die. As a comparative parameter, the melt temperature in the middle of the runner above the measuring point and the melt temperature close to the die face were monitored. Overall, the temperature was monitored in 26 evaluation points. The measurement was performed using the Magmasoft simulation software. The input settings of the casting cycle in the simulation were identical to those in real operation. It was found, that the most heavily stressed die zones by temperature were within the 20 mm from the die face. Above this distance, the heat supplied by the melt passes gradually into the entire die mass without significant temperature fluctuations. To verify the impact of the die cooling on the thermal field, a tempering system was designed to ensure different heat dissipation conditions in individual locations. At the end of the contribution, the measures proposals to reduce the high change of thermal field of dies resulting from the design of the tempering channel are presented. These proposals will be experimentally verified in the following research work.
Final quality of casts produced in a die casting process represents a correlation of setting of technological parameters of die casting cycle, properties of alloy, construction of a die and structure of gating and of bleeding systems. Suitable structure of a gating system with an appertaining bleeding system of the die can significantly influence mechanical and structural properties of a cast. The submitted paper focuses on influence of position of outfall of an gate into the cast on its selected quality properties. Layout of the test casts in the die was designed to provide filling of a shaping cavity by the melt with diverse character of flowing. Setting of input technological parameters during experiment remained on a constant level. The only variable was the position of the gate. Homogeneity represented by porosity f and ultimate strength Rm were selected to be the assessed representative quality properties of the cast. The tests of the influence upon monitored parameters were realized in two stages. The test gating system was primarily subjected to numerical tests with the utilization of a simulation program NovaFlow&Solid. Consequently, the results were verified by the experimental tests carried out with the physical casts produced during operation. It was proved that diverse placement of the gate in relation to the cast influences the mode of the melt flowing through the shaping cavity which is reflected in the porosity of the casts. The experimental test proved correlation of porosity f of the cast with its ultimate strength Rm. At the end of the paper, the interaction dependencies between the gate position, the mode of filling the die cavity, porosity f and ultimate strength Rm.
The high pressure die casting technology allows the production of complex casts with good mechanical properties, with high production repeatability within narrow tolerance limits. However, the casts are somewhat porous, which may reduce their mechanical properties. There are several recommendations for reducing the porosity of casts, which are aimed at setting the technological parameters of the casting cycle. One of the primary and important ways to reduce the porosity and air entrapment in the melt is a suitable gating system design. Submitted contribution is devoted to assessing the influence of the runner branching geometry on the air entrapment within the cast volume during the filling phase of the casting cycle. Four variants of the gating system for a particular cast are compared with different design of main runner branching. The initial design is based on a real gating system where the secondary runner is connected to the main runner at an angle of 90 °. The modified designs are provided with a continuous transition of the main runner into the secondary ones, with the change in the branching runner radius r1 = 15 mm, r2 = 25 mm and r3 = 35 mm. The air entrapment in the melt is assessed within the cast volume behind the cores, which have been evaluated as a critical points with respect to further mechanical treatment. When designing the structural modification of geometry it was assumed that by branch changing using the radius value r3 = 35 mm, the melt flows fluently, and thus the value of the entrapped air in the volume of the cast will be the lowest. This assumption was disproved. The lowest values of entrapped air in the melt were found in the casts with runner transition designed with radius r1 = 15 mm. The conclusion of the contribution explains the causes of this phenomenon and from a designing point of view it presents proposal for measures to reduce the entrapment of the air in casts.