I’ve been playing around with the Gingery Foundry and I’ve discovered that lost foam casting is dramatically easier than trying to make split forms in sand. With green sand cope-and-drag casting you have to make the pattern in wood, ram up half the mold, flip it over without spilling sand everywhere, ram up the other half the mold, lift off the cope - again without spilling sand everywhere, gingerly take out the pattern, line your cope and drag up properly, and then pour your melt.
With lost foam casting you basically just have to make the pattern in foam and bury it in sand. It doesn’t even need to be special sand. Regular old play sand works pretty well. If you want a better surface finish, you can coat the pattern in something like drywall mud before you bury it. Plus you can cast a much wider variety of shapes and not have to worry about parting plane geometry. It’s just all around easier.