The Technology of Using Liquid Glass Mixture Waste for Reducing the Harmful Environmental Impact

Materials (Basel). 2022 Feb 6;15(3):1220. doi: 10.3390/ma15031220.

Abstract

The spent liquid glass mixture, which is widely used in foundries as a binder after knocking out of moldings, contains pieces of different sizes and strengths, and there is a strong silicate film on the sand grains themselves. The proposed regeneration plants, which provide for the removal of the silicate film by scrubbing, have low productivity and lead to abrasion of the grains themselves. For this reason, the knocked-out mixture is taken to the dump. As a result of the study of the state of the spent liquid glass mixture in the dump, it was found that, in the spent mixture that had lain for 8-10 years, under prolonged exposure to atmospheric precipitation at plus and minus temperatures, part of the silicate film dissolves and almost all monolithic pieces are destroyed. Further use of hydraulic regeneration allows us to reduce the film thickness and thereby reduce the percentage of liquid glass from 5-5.5% to 0.8-1.2%. This made it possible to select the composition of the molding sand for an automatic line, using the AlpHaset-process, which consists of 22-29% of liquid glass mixture from a dump, 65-72% of liquid glass, 5.5% of liquid glass, and a hardener in the amount of 0.55%.

Keywords: AlpHaset system; cold-hardening mixture; foundry production; reclaimed product; sand grain micro-specimen.