Assembly & Quality Testing for Investment Casting

By performing assembly and testing in-house, Texmo Blank delivers complete, ready-to-use components with verified quality and reliability. This integrated approach shortens lead times, enhances traceability, and ensures every part meets the most demanding performance standards.

Assembly at Texmo Blank

At Texmo Blank, many of our projects involve multiple components produced as part of a single order. Our in-house assembly capability allows us to fit and finish these parts before delivery, providing customers with fully assembled subcomponents that integrate seamlessly into their manufacturing process.

Testing at Texmo Blank

Texmo Blank’s testing capability ensures every component meets the highest standards of quality and performance before it leaves our facility. We apply rigorous quality control using a range of destructive and non-destructive testing methods, carried out either in-house or by accredited external laboratories.

Destructive Testing Methods

Destructive testing physically stresses components to the point of failure to understand their strength, toughness, and ductility.

Examples of Destructive Testing

• Microscopic Analysis - Involves examining the microstructure of a casting at high magnification using optical or electron microscopes. It reveals grain size, phase distribution, porosity, inclusions, and other microstructural features that affect mechanical properties and overall casting quality. This analysis helps identify defects not visible to the naked eye.
• Corrosion Testing - Evaluates how well a casting withstands exposure to corrosive environments such as moisture, salt, acids, or chemicals. Corrosion testing simulates real-world operating conditions to assess the material’s resistance to degradation, ensuring the longevity and reliability of components in harsh conditions.
• Bend Testing - Measures a material’s ability to undergo plastic deformation by bending it to a specified angle or until fracture. This test provides insight into ductility, bending strength, and the material's ability to absorb stress without cracking or breaking, which is critical for parts subjected to flexing in service.
• Impact Testing - Determines a material’s toughness by measuring the energy absorbed during a high-velocity impact, typically using a pendulum or hammer. It assesses resistance to sudden shocks or impacts and identifies brittleness, which is vital for safety-critical components.
• Tensile Testing - Pulls a specimen to its breaking point to measure ultimate tensile strength, yield strength, elongation, and reduction of area. This test quantifies a material’s ability to withstand forces that attempt to pull it apart, revealing both strength and ductility parameters.
• Stress Testing - Subjects the casting to loads or pressures beyond its normal operating conditions to assess its structural limits and failure points. It ensures that the component can endure unexpected or extreme stresses without catastrophic failure.
• Hardness Testing - Gauges a material’s resistance to surface deformation, scratching, or indentation. Various scales (Brinell, Rockwell, and Vickers) are used, depending on the material type and application. Hardness correlates with strength, wear resistance, and machinability.
• Compression Testing - Applies a crushing load to a specimen to determine its behaviour under compressive forces, including yield strength and ultimate compressive strength. This is important for parts designed to bear loads without buckling or deforming.
• Grain Etching - Utilises chemical reagents to reveal grain boundaries in metals by selectively corroding grain edges, enabling the evaluation of grain size and structure. Grain size has a direct influence on mechanical properties, including toughness, strength, and fatigue resistance.

Non-Destructive Testing Methods

This method highlights defects without damaging or affecting future use. It is cost-effective, as parts remain usable and often quicker, as it detects defects invisible to the naked eye.

Examples of Non-Destructive Testing

• Spectral analysis
• Fluid penetrant inspection
• Magnetic particle inspection
• X-ray inspection
• 3D scanners
• Dimensional testing

Destructive vs Non-Destructive Testing Methods

Destructive testing parts cannot be reused after testing, whereas non-destructive testing leaves the part intact and is more cost-effective and faster. Both are essential and are often used together to provide complete quality assurance.