ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Optimization of green sand casting process parameters
of a foundry by using Taguchi’s method
Sushil Kumar
&
P. S. Satsangi
&
D. R. Prajapati
Received: 26 May 2010 / Accepted: 8 November 2010 / Published online: 1 December 2010
#
Springer-Verlag London Limited 2010
Abstract An optimization technique for process parame-
ters of green sand casting of a cast iron differential housing
cover based on the Taguchi parameter design approach is
proposed in this paper. The process parameters considered
are green strength, moisture content, pouring temperature,
and mould hardness vertical and horizontal. An attempt has
been made to obtain optimal level of the process parameters
in order to yield the optimum quality characteristics of the
cast iron differential housing cover castings. An orthogonal
array, the signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio, and analysis of
variance are used to analyze the effect of selected process
parameters and their levels on the casting defects. The
results indicate that the selected process parameters signif-
icantly affect the casting defects of grey cast iron
differential housing cover castings. A confirmation run is
used to verify the results, which indicated that this method
is more efficient in determining the best casting parameters
for differential housing cover.
Keywords Green sand casting
.
Casting defects
.
Taguchi
method
.
Gray cast iron
.
Differential housing cover
List of symbols
r Number of tests in a trial
y
i
Response value of observation in the ith test
DOE Design of experiments
ν Total degrees of freedom
ν
A
Degrees of freedom for factor A
k
A
Number of levels for factor A
ν
A×B
Degrees of freedom for the interaction of
factors A and B
ν
LN
Total degrees of freedom of the available
orthogonal array
N Number of trials
ANOVA Analysis of variance
V Variance of factor
SS Sum of square
V′ Expected amount of variation
P Percent contribution
μ Mean
α Level of risk
ν
e
Degrees of freedom for the error
V
e
Error variance
F(α,1,νe) F ratio at the level of risk
η
eff
Effective number of replications
n Total number of experiments
CI Confidence interval
T Average values of casting defects at different
levels
1 Introduction
A large number of experimental investigations linking
green sand casting parameters with casting quality have
been carried out by researchers and foundry engineers over
the past few decades [1]. It has been recognized that green
sand casting parameters design plays one of the key
elements in casting quality. The casting process has a large
number of parameters that may affect the quality of
S. Kumar (*)
Mechanical Engineering Department,
Indo Global College of Engineering,
Abhipur,
Mohali, Punjab, India
e-mail: sushilt6512@gmail.com
P. S. Satsangi
:
D. R. Prajapati
Mechanical Engineering Department,
PEC University of Technology,
Chandigarh, India
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2011) 55:23–34
DOI 10.1007/s00170-010-3029-0