Advanced Manufacturing Technique for Casting SX/DX Turbine Components

We propose a new method of casting turbine blades to achieve directional solidification (DS) or single crystal solidification (SX) without withdrawl, which is currently the only manufacturing technique in use to make DS or SX castings. This newmanufacturing process will significantly improve the throughput from a casting furnace and quality of cast parts, hence reducing the manufacturing costs and improving the quality of cast turbine blades (airfoils) and integrally bladed disks (blisks). Thethroughput and qualilty will be improved because the new process does not rely on moving the parts through a baffled hot/cold zone to control the temperature gradient in the part during solidification. We anticipate that this technique will also allowcomplex geometries to be successfully cast in DS or SX orientation, which can significantly extend the life of the cast parts, compared to equiaxed castings.