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Silva
On the Use of an Incremental
Casting Technique to Obtain Color
Gradients in Jewelry Components
Abstract
The production of colored gold-based components (white, red, pink, blue, green,
purple, yellow, etc.) is widely known but the production of multi-colored pieces
(with two, three or more colors and a smooth gradient in between) in one casting
step (without components soldering) is a totally new manufacturing process. This
process applies to the production of gold artifacts including the jewelry field. Its
main advantage is the ability to develop and produce jewelry pieces with
innovative designs. The basis of the process is the production of gold-based
components with a controlled color gradient. This is obtained with the control of
the alloy chemical composition along the piece. The component’s production will
be based on an incremental process of melting and solidification.
The process is essentially based on a continuous melting of the base materials
by induction heating inside a mold with the addition of new elements or alloys
in order to continuously change the component’s chemical composition. By the
control of the process variables (materials added, melting and solidification rates)
it will be possible to obtain a component with the desired chemical composition
gradients. The chemical composition gradient will be selected considering the
aesthetic of the component and the physical, metallurgical and mechanical
properties of the intermediate phases formed in the component. The end of the
process yields jewelry pieces (polychromatic pieces like rings, pendants, etc.)
with controlled color gradients along the component in both a micro and macro
scale.
1. Introduction
While some recent experiments have been carried out using the Incremental
Melting and Solidification Process (IMSP), it is still a new field of materials
processing for the production of functionally graded materials,1,2,3 and there is
still a substantial lack of information on this process, especially in regards to
different materials.
are continuously fed to the mold are melted by induction heating. This procedure
creates a gradual melting at the top of the casting and solidification at the
bottom of the casting. The IMSP proceeds from the bottom to the top of the mold
by changing the relative position between the mold and the heating apparatus.
This process allows the possibility of having locally controlled properties on a
single component. It permits a new concept of materials design that may be used
to respond to tailoring of components that will be exposed to different local
solicitations, either mechanical or environmental, under particular applications. In
the case of jewelry components, which are mainly dependent on aesthetic aspects,
the different properties are mainly physical such as color and brightness, etc.
Furthermore, the IMSP is expected to allow the production of components
with a smooth chemical transition between dissimilar materials. The interface
region might have lengths in the order of hundreds of micrometers to tens of
millimeters, if necessary. The gradual transition allows for a smoother transition
in metallurgical, mechanical and physical properties of the materials and
consequently creates components with a different aesthetic then those with
different colors but obtained with welding processes where sharp color
transitions occur.
Further to the chemical composition transition, this process is able to control
the solidification behavior in any point on the casting in a specific way. This
means that even with a homogeneous alloy it is possible to substantially vary
some metallurgical features such as grain size and grain orientation, thereby
providing different mechanical, wear and physical properties in different parts of
the component.
This paper is concerned with the possibility of producing functionally graded
alloys with an extended transition region between two dissimilar materials as
well as with the control of the metallurgical properties along a homogeneous
material.
Anot
a com
cooli
meta
exper
Tabl
an
Figure 2 Schematic representation of the IMS Process
Te
N
1
2
3
4
5
b) I
d
A
In th
state
Figure 3 a) position of the thermocouples inside the mold 0.1m
and initial position of coil in relation to the mold; part
b) dimensions of the specimen obtained (mm) the m
stopp
The
a) Incremental cooling with homogeneous alloys for different mold (by S
dislocation rates perce
Phas
These experiments were performed in two steps. First the mold was heated in a
was m
defined position inside the coil (Position 1 in Figure 2) with the material inside the
mold from the beginning of the test; after the mold reached a certain temperature
with the material melted, the mold started to move downwards within the fixed
coil. The mold movement stopped when the mold was out of the coil (see Position 3. R
3 in Figure 2). Throughout the whole process the bottom of the mold was water
a) I
cooled and the heating power remained constant. With this procedure, at a
certain moment the temperature at the lower part of the mold is below the
d
‘solidus’ (the material is solid), while the upper part of the mold is still above the These
liquidus temperature (the alloy is still liquid). Thus progressive solidification is the m
promoted from the bottom to the top of the casting. The thermal cycles for each the ca
test are presented in Figures 4 and 6 for the two alloys and for the different the m
relative mold dislocation rates. for th
On the Use of an Incremental Casting Technique to Obtain Color Gradients in
382 Jewelry Components
Silva
Another test was performed without mold movement. This test was used for
a comparative baseline in order to know what the influence of the directional
cooling in the castings would be. The samples were characterized in terms of
metallurgical and chemical properties in the axial direction of the specimen. The
experimental conditions are presented in Table 1.
Figure 4 a) Temperature curves for the Ag-rich alloy with coil movement
rate of 0.5mm/s; b) detail of the temperature curves in the solidification range
Silva
seen that, due to the relative position of the coil in relation to the mold but more
importantly due to the proximity of the thermocouple T5 to the cooling system
(Figures 2 and 3a), the temperature at the bottom of the mold is lower than the
temperature in all other positions by about 100ºC (180°F). In the remaining
positions the temperatures are mainly dependent on the position of the mold
relative to the induction coil. There is a difference among the other thermocouples
of less than 30ºC (54°F).
The second part of the thermal cycle is when the mold starts to move downwards.
The main aspect to highlight (Figure 4) is that the movement has a strong
influence on the temperature distribution along the mold axis. Temperatures T3,
T4 and T5 start to decrease but T0, T1 and T2 increase for a certain period. These
profiles are strongly dependent on the dimensions of the coil and the mold used.
In these particular experiments the height of the mold is greater than that of the
coil (see Figure 3). After a few seconds, when T0 reaches the peak temperature, all
the temperatures start to decrease. It is observed that temperatures at this moment
have a difference of about 350ºC (630°F) between the extreme positions, T0 and T5,
and provide a regular step among the different thermocouples between the top
and bottom of the mold.
Figures 5a and 5b show that, during the solidification intervals in both alloys when
there is mold movement, the temperature cooling rates are higher in position T0
and lower for position T5. Thus, although the solidification sequence is from
position T5 to position T0, the solidification rates follow the opposite sequence.
It can be seen in Figures 5a and 5b that the solidification rates are very different
between mold positions and also substantially differ with mold dislocation rate.
As a comparison, temperature profiles in tests with no movement of the mold are
also provided. Figure 6 presents temperatures profiles obtained in the castings of
the Ag-rich and Cu-rich alloys without mold movement.
The temperature profiles are very different. Part one of the thermal cycle is
similar but after the alloy is fully melted and the induction power is switched off,
the temperature profiles are very different from those in Figure 4. The maximum
temperature difference in the different mold positions at the solidification interval
is less than 100ºC (180°F), which is much lower than that shown in Figure 4, and
the rates of temperature decrease are very similar among the different positions
(Figure 5). The solidification still proceeds from bottom to top but with very
close cooling rates between positions. The bottom part of the mold remains water
cooled during the whole test.
These
be se
move
conse
rate i
prop
Figure 7 a) Temperature curves obtained in the IMSP for the experiments
the S
with movment of the coil for graded chemical composition;
b) detail of the temperature curves in the solidification range
On the Use of an Incremental Casting Technique to Obtain Color Gradients in
388 Jewelry Components
a) b)
Figure 11 Chemical composition along the sample’s vertical axis for Figur
a) Ag-rich alloy; b) Cu-rich alloy.
On the Use of an Incremental Casting Technique to Obtain Color Gradients in
390 Jewelry Components
Silva
e, the
o the different dissimilar materials: from Cu-rich (80Cu20Ag) to Ag-rich
ttom. (95Ag5Cu)
ottom In this test a mold dislocation rate of 0.1mm/s was selected. For the test with
variation of chemical composition from Ag-rich to Cu-rich imposed by two
material additions, the solidification characteristics are quite different and much
more complex. Between the initial alloy chemical compositions there is a eutectic
transformation (Figure 2). Thus, chemical composition of the resulting sample
will start with an alloy rich in the Cu phase (Figure 12a) in the bottom region. The
eutectic constituent increases until a certain region in the middle of the sample
(Figure 12b) and from that point on the Ag phase increases until the top region
of the sample (Figure 12c, d and e). The resulting chemical composition
evolution along the sample is shown in Figure 13b. It can be seen that the second
alloy added mixed with the liquid phase in the first alloy added and the liquid
material almost homogenized. The chemical composition variation occurred in
a limited region of about 10-15mm of the sample. This result shows that there is
already a substantial gradient region between initial alloys. However, in order
to obtain smoother transitions there are other possibilities such as using other
processing parameters or adopting a procedure with more additions of material.
For example, after the first addition of a Cu-rich phase there can be two or more
alloy additions of the Ag-rich alloy.
owest
opper
mical
s that
ation
a) b) c) d) e)
eases
om to Figure 12 The microstructure from the bottom a), to the top e) of a casting
e and
The solidification rates along the sample are shown in Figure 7. The SDAS graph
is presented in Figure 13a. This graph shows again that for higher solidification
rates the grain size is smaller.
a) b)
Figure 13 a) Alloy SDAS, b) and mean chemical composition along the sample’s vertical
axis for the experiments with graded chemical composition
components. It also shows that even for homogeneous alloys the process may give
rise to different metallurgical properties along the component.
Obviously the process is not easy but with a careful coordination of the
temperature profiles along the piece (by changing the power input along the
casting) with the characteristics of the new materials additions (chemical
composition, addition time, quantity of added material, and temperature of the
added material – solid or liquid state), it will be possible to control the final phase
morphology distribution and respective mechanical properties.
In the case of jewelry components this process allows aesthetic effects like
those shown in the following pictures. Figure 14 shows two components with a
controlled solidification: one with elongated grains and the other with regular
grains. Figure 15 shows a component with changing chemical composition from
left to right and approximately equal grain size from left to right.
This process allows the designer to have tools for enhancing the aesthetics of the
jewelry components and to provide a completely new and unique type of jewelry
component.
4. Conclusions
The main conclusions drawn from this work are as follows:
• The Incremental Melting and Solidification Process allows the production
of materials with controlled gradient chemical compositions.
• The incremental solidification process allows the production of
homogeneous alloys with changing microstructure along the component.
• The incremental solidification process is strongly dependent on the
solidification characteristics of the alloy as imposed by the mold
dislocation rate.
• A smooth, controlled gradient transition is possible with several
material additions.