Sand moulds are used in the casting process. However, after heating, the binder in the sand loses the binding properties, and the most part of the foundry sand has to be discarded from the process. The waste foundry sand after the regeneration can be recycled, and reclamation can reduce the production cost and lower waste emissions. The objective of this work was to investigate the possibility of reusing the animal glue binder waste foundry sand from the study of three regeneration methods. Studies with the waste foundry sand and reclaimed sand were performed in order to compare the results obtained with raw sand. The characterization of the samples was performed by scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive spectroscopy. Results show that the waste sand was regenerated by mechanical regeneration, thermal regeneration and wet reclamation, respectively. The reclaimed sands have a better performance than the waste foundry sand, and are similar to raw sand. Further, the wet regeneration method is the best one among the three methods.
Keywords: animal glue waste sand; clay content; loss on ignition; reclaimed sand; waste sand regeneration.