Investment casting

Valve for Nuclear Power Station produced using investment casting

Main article: Investment casting

Investment casting (known as lost-wax casting in art) is a process that has been practised for thousands of years, with the lost-wax process being one of the oldest known metal forming techniques. From 5000 years ago, when bees wax formed the pattern, to today’s high technology waxes, refractory materials and specialist alloys, the castings, ensure high-quality components are produced with the key benefits of accuracy, repeatability, versatility and integrity.

Investment casting derives its name from the fact that the pattern is invested, or surrounded, with a refractory material. The wax patterns require extreme care for they are not strong enough to withstand forces encountered during the mold making. One advantage of investment casting it that the wax can be reused.^[5]

The process is suitable for repeatable production of net shape components, from a variety of different metals and high performance alloys. Although generally used for small castings, this process has been used to produce complete aircraft door frames, with steel castings of up to 300 kg and aluminium castings of up to 30 kg. Compared to other casting processes such as die casting or sand casting, it can be an expensive process, however the components that can be produced using investment casting can incorporate intricate contours, and in most cases the components are cast near net shape, so requiring little or no rework once cast.