In order to design and produce high-quality castings with reliable performance, the effect of the melt handling and melt quality during different processing stages needs to be understood and controlled, and numerical methods to provide correct input data to structural analyses of castings enabled. This paper aims to investigate tensile properties, in particular tensile toughness, of a secondary high-pressure die casting (HPDC) aluminium alloy with different levels of defects and imperfections. The melt, which was transported in liquid state from the smelter to the foundry, has been sampled after different holding times by casting into Y-blocks. Tensile testing was performed, and the levels of defects and imperfections were characterized using measurements of porosity, bifilm index, density index, sludge factor and the amount of iron-rich intermetallics. Two different quality indices have been evaluated, and a method to apply the results in simulations of damage in a casting, containing defects, subjected to load is demonstrated.