Overview

Eastern Alloys is now offering Con-Cast Zinc Bar Stock for prototyping. Prototyping is a very important stage in product development, by helping engineers determine if parts can or cannot be made in the material being tested.  

There are many reasons to prototype including:  

• Prototyping can be simple, giving quick results to the end user for fast decision making.
• Prototyping helps eliminate costly retooling procedures required when parts fail preliminary testing.  Changes can be made to the part instead of the tool.
• If prototyping is not used, the end user may give up after the first round of testing because of the added time and expense of retooling the die for additional prototyping samples.   

There are many different ways to prototype for zinc die castings.  Machining prototype parts from Con-Cast Zinc Bar Stock is a fast, simple and easy approach, producing very similar properties as actual zinc die castings.  Other advantages of using Con-cast Zinc Bar stock are:  

• The material is readily available - so there are no long lead times (unless unusual sizes are requested).
• There is no wait for tools to be machined.
• Con-Cast bar stock can be used for functional testing as well as aesthetic properties (plating, powder coating, etc.).  

Properties

The following table gives the properties of Con-Cast parts compared to Die Casting and Sand Casting processes.  As shown, the Con-cast zinc bar stock properties are very similar to the die casting component, with the exception of elongation.  If elongation is a required property, than a simple heat treatment of ZA12 alloy, will produce very similar results to Zamak 3 die castings.  Heat treated ZA12 bars can also be available upon request.

Shapes and Sizes

There are many sizes and shapes of con-cast bar stock available, including round bar stock diameters ranging from ¾" to 9" and rectangular bar stock sections of 5/8" to 8".  Hexagonal bar stock is also available upon request.