Model Study of the Continuous Casting of Slab

Abstract

A simulation study has been made of the continuous casting of slab using potassium chloride solution. Solidification profiles from the meniscus to the bottom of a mushy zone, the regions of forced convection caused by the inlet stream and the temperature distribution in the slab have been observed under the various casting speed by the use of a straight nozzle and a bifurcated nozzle, respectively.
Experimental results show that there exist some differences between the profile of liquidus line in the region of the forced convection for the run with a straight nozzle and that with a bifurcated nozzle. It may be considered that such differences are caused from the differences in the flow patterns and the temperature distributions in a liquid pool for each run mentioned above.
Furthermore, it has been found that the differences in the profiles of solidus line for each run are almost negligibly small and that the primary dendrite arm spacings in the region being affected by the forced convection are different between the runs with each nozzle.
Solidification profiles obtained in these experiments are compared with the profiles predicted by the mathematical model which was priviously presented by the authors.