Pressure-vacuum casting

One essential difference between casting and molding processes is that pressure need not be used in casting (although large-volume, complex parts can be made by low pressure and/or vacuum casting methods). Another difference is that the starting material is usually in liquid form rather than the usual solid plastic used in other processes. There is also the difference that the liquid could be a monomer rather than the plastic used in most other processes and in turn the monomer is converted to a polymer/plastic (Chapter 1). 

Vacuum Casting. A slip casting (q.v.) process in which the casting rate is increased by applying a vacuum to the outside of a porous mould. Cf. pressure casting. 

High-pressure vacuum die casting. A casting formed when metal is injected into a cavity containing no air under pressures ranging from 14 to 70 MPa. Such castings may be subjected to temperatures of up to 450°C without blisters. 

Similar to screen printing, the spray coating method [95] is widely used for catalyst fabrication, especially in labs. The major difference between the two is that the viscosity of the ink for spray coating is much lower than that for screen printing. The application apparatus can be a manual spray gun or an auto-spraying system with programmed X-Y axes, movable robotic arm, an ink reservoir and supply loop, ink atomization, and a spray nozzle with adjustable flux and pressure. The catalyst ink can be coated on the gas diffusion layer or cast directly on the membrane. To prevent distortion and swelling of the membrane, either it is converted into Na+ form or a vacuum table is used to fix the membrane. The catalyst layer is dried in situ or put into an oven to remove the solvent. 

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