Internal Cracks and Non-Metallic Inclusions as Root Causes of Casting Failure in Sugar Mill Roller Shafts
Muhammad Jamil,
Aqib Mashood Khan,
Hussien Hegab,
Shoaib Sarfraz,
Neeraj Sharma,
Mozammel Mia,
Munish Kumar Gupta,
GuLong Zhao,
H. Moustabchir,
Catalin I. Pruncu
Affiliations
Muhammad Jamil
Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Engineering and Technology, Taxila, Pakistan
Aqib Mashood Khan
Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Engineering and Technology, Taxila, Pakistan
Hussien Hegab
Mechanical Design and Production Engineering Department, Cairo University, Giza 12163, Egypt
Shoaib Sarfraz
Manufacturing Department, School of Aerospace, Transport and Manufacturing, Cranfield University, Cranfield, Bedfordshire, MK43 0AL, UK
Neeraj Sharma
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Maharishi Markandeshwar (Deemed to be University), Mullana 133207, India
Mozammel Mia
Mechanical and Production Engineering, Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology, Dhaka 1208, Bangladesh
Munish Kumar Gupta
Key Laboratory of High Efficiency and Clean Mechanical Manufacture, Ministry of Education, School of Mechanical Engineering, Shandong University, Jingshi Road, Jinan 250061, China
GuLong Zhao
College of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
H. Moustabchir
Laboratory of Systems Engineering and Applications (LISA), National School of Applied Sciences of Fez, Fez, Morocco
Catalin I. Pruncu
Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London, Exhibition Rd., London SW7 2AZ, UK
The sugar mill roller shaft is one of the critical parts of the sugar industry. It requires careful manufacturing and testing in order to meet the stringent specification when it is used for applications under continuous fatigue and wear environments. For heavy industry, the manufacturing of such heavy parts (>600 mm diameter) is a challenge, owing to ease of occurrence of surface/subsurface cracks and inclusions that lead to the rejection of the final product. Therefore, the identification and continuous reduction of defects are inevitable tasks. If the defect activity is controlled, this offers the possibility to extend the component (sugar mill roller) life cycle and resistance to failure. The current study aims to explore the benefits of using ultrasonic testing (UT) to avoid the rejection of the shaft in heavy industry. This study performed a rigorous evaluation of defects through destructive and nondestructive quality checks in order to detect the causes and effects of rejection. The results gathered in this study depict macro-surface cracks and sub-surface microcracks. The results also found alumina and oxide type non-metallic inclusions, which led to surface/subsurface cracks and ultimately the rejection of the mill roller shaft. A root cause analysis (RCA) approach highlighted the refractory lining, the hot-top of the furnace and the ladle as significant causes of inclusions. The low-quality flux and refractory lining material of the furnace and the hot-top, which were possible causes of rejection, were replaced by standard materials with better quality, applied by their standardized procedure, to prevent this problem in future production. The feedback statistics, evaluated over more than one year, indicated that the rejection rate was reduced for defective production by up to 7.6%.
