As Times Change Smart Solutions for Castings and Sand Treatment find their Way into Foundries.
The Cyrus company has supplied the casting industry with custom-built machinery for decades now, convincing them with rugged design and low-maintenance equipment. On the European market Cyrus is among the leading companies in the area of vibration technology in the castings, scrap recycling and forging industries.
Changing requirements made on casting quality and reduced production costs call for ever smarter solutions for moulding sand treatment. Furthermore, the costs associated with plant layout (structural measures) play a major role in the decision-making processes involved in system deployment. In the aforementioned areas solutions like resonance machines with vibration absorbers for the transportation of castings and sand as well as electronic transmissions for the area of casting-sand separation are very important, even for small moulding plants.
One of the main reasons for the use of resonance machinery in absorption technology is, for instance, that the static and dynamic loads with large conveying distances can be reduced to a minimum. In most cases this means costly reinforcement of the building statics is not needed and the benefits of materials handling by means of vibratory conveying systems can still be enjoyed. This means: 1. No rotatable/movable components in the product stream. 2. No problems caused by elevated product temperatures. 3. Transportation that is gentle on the material conveyed. 4. Few wear parts. 5. Low operating and maintenance costs.
Listed below are some examples of successfully employed long-distance conveyor installations featuring resonance vibration trough conveyors with absorber technology and electronic transmission for e.g. separator screens with circular motion drives as well as vibration motors.
1. Resonance Trough Conveyor with Absorber Technology
The resonance vibratory trough conveyors with absorber technology depicted here were successfully deployed in one of the largest Scandinavian foundries. The special feature here is that these machines are delivered in compact transport units, which can be inexpensively assembled on site. Thanks to absorber technology, resonance vibratory trough conveyors make it possible to span up to 30 m in distance per machine with a minimum of dynamic and static loads and they also make it possible to incorporate curved vibratory conveyors in the plant layout. The other benefit of the resonance trough conveyors described here lies in the gentleness on the material conveyed and the very low-noise handling of cast parts. Usually, the foundation for absorber machines does not even need to be reinforced for taking up these dynamic loads since approx. 90% of all dynamic loads are absorbed anyway. For plant operators this means minimum expenses for structural rebuilding. The same technology is also used for casting coolers thereby boosting plant productivity and reducing damage to castings to a minimum.
The system shown here is used as a sorting line following a casting-sand separation chute to feed a blasting plant.
 Resonance conveyor with absorber technology |  |
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Plant Data of the Aforementioned Conveyor Line
| Total Conveying Length: | approx. 60 m |
| Material: | castings / sand |
| Conveying Capacity: | 16 t/h castings and residual sand |
| Casting Weight: | < 250 kg/pc |
| Moisture: | dry, transportable, non-baking |
| Casting temperature: | standard 150 – 180°C |
| Application: | transport with a curve / sorting chute / residual sand screening |
| Slope: | horizontal / 2° |
| Support: | steel frame, incl. vibration absorber |
| Trough Design: | sandwich incl. noise dampening through built-in interlayer |
| Working Height of Trough Bottom: | approx. 1,300 mm above foundation |
| Special Feature: | low-noise transportation and second co-vibrating trough for the residual sand transport (2 integral screening lines). |
| Installed Electrical Load: | approx. 30 KW |
2. Separator Screen with Electronic Transmission
This new development of a separator screen and/or vibratory machine control, i.e. “electronic transmission” made by Cyrus makes it possible to optimise the casting-sand separation after the moulding plant. Here emphasis is placed on the highest flexibility possible in casting-sand separation and on casting-saving transport.
This is achieved by infinitely adapting both the vibration angle and the drive frequency depending on the product to be handled. The information provided by the moulding plant (casting type) is used here to call up the corresponding program parameters in the electronic gear (control). This means the moulding plant can call up the menu parameters of the separator screen via a digital signal or Profibus within seconds through corresponding output signals. As a result each out-fed mould (thick-walled, normal thickness, thin-walled casting) can be handled differently. Cyrus separator screens can also be refitted from mechanical gears to electronic transmissions without any problem. To this end the mechanical gears are replaced by 2 standard AC motors incl. the control and rotation angle detector. Refitting with electronic transmissions causes no problems either for small casting-sand separator troughs that only need vibration motors.
Here the maximum productivity of your plant is achieved.
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Functioning Principle of the “Electronic Transmission”:
Two vibration motors or, alternatively, two Cyrus exciters in conjunction with 2 standard three-phase motors provide frequency-controlled drive. Due to the special control using frequency converters the RPM as well as the phase shift between the two motors can be adjusted in such a way that the angle of the vibration introduced and the acceleration applied can be adjusted infinitely. The controllable drive RPM is between 600 and 1,000 min-1 (10-17 Hz machine frequency) depending on the application.
Application Examples:
| Gentle Transportation of Castings | Low vertical acceleration (low material stress) High horizontal acceleration (high conveying speed) approx. 20° - 50° angle of throw => Optimised transportation that is gentle on castings incl. casting-sand separation by simultaneous adjustment of the angle of throw and the drive frequency within specified limits. |
| Standard Casting-Sand Seperation and Handling | Normal vertical & horizontal acceleration (normal castings-sand separation) approx. 40° - 70° angle of throw. => Normal / optimised lump breaking and & casting-sand Separation incl. transport by means of simultaneous adjustment of the angle of throw and the drive frequency within the specified limits. |
| Casting-Sand Seperation at Reduced Conveying Speed | High vertical acceleration (optimised casting-sand separation) reduced horizontal acceleration (optimised casting sand separation / lower conveying speed) |
The examples mentioned here can vary depending on the casting/sand qualities.
The system described here was already successfully used for Cyrus separator screens for casting-sand separation as well as for vibratory trough conveyors as sorting chutes with manipulator operation.
To ensure operation that is gentle on manipulators the sorting chute was adjusted in such a way that it does not introduce any vertical shocks into the manipulator tongs (approx. 0° angle of throw). As soon as the manipulator arm is situated outside the sorting chute the angle of throw of the chute changes automatically from approx. 0° to 35° and it conveys normally again.
The Cyrus product range includes:
- Travelling charging machines with low-noise design
- Vibratory trough conveyors for extremely high-duty applications (e.g. below shredders and/or after scrap shears)
- Plate conveyors for scrap recycling and forge applications
- Shake-out grids
- Sand lump breaker
- Trough/pipe conveyors
- Screening machines
- Vibralift (vertical conveyor)
- Hoisting and tilting devices
- Automatic dosing machines as singulation and feeding devices
- Casting-sand separating chutes
- Resonance conveying systems
At present, you can find Cyrus representatives and partners in Asia, Latin America, Scandinavia, South Africa, Spain and France.
Click here for more Information and Contact to Cyrus GmbH Schwingtechnik in our Suppliers Profile
