Different Types of Investment Casting Materials

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Investment casting can produce a wide variety of products and prototypes, but it is important to choose the correct investment casting material for your application. The right material can help you achieve the desired functionality, save on material costs, eliminate unnecessary casting defects, and reduce the need for secondary operations after the casting is complete.

Copper alloy investment casting final parts can exhibit smooth surfaces and dimensional accuracy while allowing for lighter weight, thin walls, or other beneficial properties. Determining which properties can be successfully incorporated into your part depends largely on the choice of material.

Investment Casting Materials
There are a variety of alloys to choose from during the material selection process for precision bushings. These include:

Stainless steel
Stainless steel offers exceptional durability compared to many other materials. The potential of this material has led designers and engineers to increasingly use investment casting. Applications of stainless steel include transmission components in automotive applications, various gears, camping components and golf club heads.

Low-alloy steel
Low alloy steels are among the most commonly used steels in the mechanical world due to their affordability and beneficial mechanical properties. Specialized heat treatment processes allow the design of parts with different properties in different areas of the same workpiece. For example, different heat treatments can be used to make one surface tough and impact-resistant, while another surface becomes wear-resistant.

aluminum alloy
Aluminum alloy is the most used material in investment casting. Industries that use it the most include aerospace, avionics, electronics, and military.

Due to improvements in material strength and the availability of high-quality castings made of aluminum-silicon-magnesium alloys, castings are now available for demanding applications such as airframe components.

Carbon steel
Carbon steel is a common low-cost material that comes in a variety of grades, classified according to the carbon content. The strength, ductility and performance of carbon steel for industrial applications can be improved by heat treatment. Its ferromagnetic properties make carbon steel useful in motors and appliances. It is safe, durable and has high structural integrity, making it one of the most commonly used alloys in the world.

super alloy
Superalloys based on nickel and cobalt have common uses in the aerospace, energy, medical, chemical and marine industries. Nickel-based alloys have higher strength at high temperatures, while cobalt-based alloys have better corrosion resistance, oxidation resistance and wear resistance than nickel-based alloys. Superalloys are increasingly replacing sheet metal as they offer high rigidity and excellent service characteristics while still being a cost-effective option.

copper alloy
Copper-based alloys are corrosion resistant and have low wear rates. They are often used in applications such as marine or pump propellers, electrical components and plumbing components. A versatile material with over 400 different alloys and a variety of properties.

Many part types can be investment cast with copper-based alloys. The more common types of copper-based alloys include bronze and brass. The strongest copper alloy is beryllium-copper, which has similar properties to high-strength alloy steels, but is more resistant to corrosion over extended periods of time.

cast iron
Iron castings, typically including gray iron and ductile iron, are known for their high precision and affordability. Ductile iron has high strength, heat resistance and toughness, but its production process is more complicated than other steels. This results in higher production costs than cast steel.