Abstract
An alternative approach to measure active clay in green sand has been developed. While active clay determination using methylene blue adsorption is a comparison of the cation exchange capacity (CEC) of greensand to the CEC of a reference bentonite, the new technique allows direct CEC measurement by adsorption of highly selective Cu(II)-triethylenetetramine dye and subsequent quantification in a spectrophotometer. The difference in concentration of the dye before and after reaction to the greensand allows to calculate the number of adsorption sites in the molding sand, which are predominately attributed to present smectite clay minerals. The result obtained is the CEC of the molding sand, which can be used to calculate the active clay content or number of smectite clay minerals, respectively, by literature data or the CEC of a reference sample. The test procedure can discriminate among various levels of active clay content, regardless if sodium or calcium bentonite is available in silica sand. Results in this study with the new approach show repeatability with acceptable test-to-test variability when measuring green sand samples from 6 to 12% active clay. Increasing sample weight allows to discriminate active clay levels even below 4 weight-%. The new proposed method eliminates systematic errors of the methylene blue test and offers advantages in usability and accuracy.
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Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge contributions from Dariush Moradinezhad, Selda Renda and Rachel Koeiman for their technical support in the Metal Casting Laboratory at WMU. Additionally, thanks to Tolsa Wyoming Bentonite for their support. This project was supported by the AFS; a special thank you to Brian Rachwitz, Steve Neltner and the late Mary Beth Krysiak from the AFS 4M Research Committee for guidance and encouragement. We would also like to thank Tolsa Wyoming Benton-ite for their support.
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Decher, A., Ramrattan, S. A New Measure for Active Clay in Green Sand. Inter Metalcast 15, 373–381 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40962-020-00514-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40962-020-00514-2