Vacuum casting with room temperature vulcanising rubber and aluminium moulds for rapid manufacturing of quality parts: a comparative study

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare costs and dimensional control parameters between same geometry parts obtained by same prototyping techniques using different material moulds. Vacuum casting was used to obtain prototypes of a three-blade helix of a motor boat propeller. Aluminium and room temperature vulcanising (RTV) rubber moulds were manufactured and tested within the study. Manufacturing costs and dimensional control parameters were used within the comparison study. For the dimensional deviation performance factor used, no significant differences were observed relatively to the dimensional control parameters measured. However, the average deviations were smaller for the RTV rubber mould prototype.