In this work, the production of ceramic moulds for aluminium casting using a stereolithographic apparatus (SLA) is presented.
Suspensions of silica powders in a photoreactive resin were used in a standard SLA equipment in order to build green parts. SLA, SLA‐250 (3D System, Valencia, CA) was modified in order to fabricate a ceramic green parts.
A characterization of mechanical properties of the material samples was performed. Finally, moulds for aluminium casting were obtained either using the stereolithographic part as a green mould, either by pyrolisis of the organic binder and subsequent sintering at high temperature.
Future investigations will be devoted to optimise the process and the mechanical performances of the sintered parts, improving the rheological properties of suspensions and reducing the building time.
This is a novel work on the production of ceramic moulds for aluminium casting using a SLA.
