EFFECT OF CASTING SPEED AND TEMPERATURE ON SOLIDIFICATION OF DIRECT CHILL ALUMINIUM BILLETS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF LOW FREQUENCY ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELD

A model for simulation of direct chill casting under the influence of low frequency electromagnetic field was employed to calculate axisymmetric billet solidification under different casting parameters. Ten cases were calculated in order to study the combined effect of casting speed, casting temperature and external electromagnetic force on the melt flow and temperature distribution. All simulations are performed for the same geometry - an Al-5.25wt%Cu alloy billet with diameter of 288 mm. The model uses induction and conservation equations in order to model the coupled effect of electromagnetic field and melt flow. The spatial discretization is performed with a meshless diffuse approximate method. An explicit time stepping scheme was used. The macroscopic transport model results are subsequently used in two other independent models for solving the solid mechanics and microscopic grain growth equations.