Shell sand is widely used to make a complex shape castings due to its good collapsibility. When molten metal is poured into the mold, various gases are generated by the thermal decomposition of binder in the shell core. Casting defects such as blow hole and blister come from these gases. If it is possible to predict the evolution of gas quantitatively, it may provide effective solutions for minimizing the casting defects. To examine the gas evolution by shell core quantitatively, casting experiment and calculation were carried out. Gas pressure and gas volume evolved by shell core were measured in the experiment, and temperature distribution in the shell core was obtained by heat transfer analysis. From the result above, prediction on the gas volume evolved during pouring was tried. As forming pressure of the shell core increased and forming temperature decreased, the gas evolution increased. There was a close relationship between the calculated gas volume evolved and the measured one. (Received July 20, 1998)