Investigation of rewetting

phenomena in direct chill casting

RAHNEESH M

M. Tech in Thermal Power Engineering

Department of Mechanical Engineering

NATIONAL INSTITUE OF TECHNOLOGY THIRUCHIRAPALLI
Direct Chill Casting
o Semi continuous casting technique
o Non-ferrous alloys (Aluminum, Copper,
Zinc and Magnesium)

Phases of DC casting
1. Start-up phase 2. Eulerian Steady state
3. End phase

Objectives
o To model the real-time casting process
with water cooling boundary conditions
and ingot flow rate

o To understand the cooling difficulties

such as ‘Water Ejection‘
Fig : DC Casting
 Direct Chill Casting

Cooling Mechanism
o Primary Cooling zone

o Secondary Cooling zone

o Base cooling

Fig : Cooling mechanism

Impingement Zone Free Falling Zone

o Water jet strikes the hot surface of the o Water flow increases with Ingot length

ingot o Eventually vapor layer collapses

o Thin vapor layer on the surface prevent
o Wetting of surface occurs below
water - “Water Ejection” Impingement zone
 Water Jet Behavior on Ingot Surface
IR – Impingement Region
FFR – Free Falling Region
Liquid Water
Vapour Film

17o

Impingement
Point Temperature
Leidenfrost IR
Temperature

Rewetting
Temperature FFR

1 Leidenfrost 2 Film 3 Front 4 No Film

Effect Collapse Propagation Boiling
Fig : Jet behavior on ingot surface
Temperature Measurements (Experimental setup)
y (Ingot height)

15 mm
Growing Ingot

Radiation region
K4 (150 mm) Ingot – 380 x 1550mm x 7000mm
Impingement region K4
K3
K3 (100 mm) K2
K1
Free
falling region
K2 (50 mm)

K1 (20 mm)
0
fig : Bottom Block and thermocouple
Bottom block

z (width) x (Ingot thickness)

Experimental Temperature Profile

K2 K3
K1
A B
K4
D
C
A-B : Radiation Cooling
(less cooling)
B-C : Impingement cooling
(moderate cooling)
C-D : No cooling
D-E : Intense Cooling

[1]
 Boundary conditions
 

o Billet : Length = 1000mm (growing with time)

o Diameter = 455mm

Fig : Bottom portion of FEM mesh with corresponding

boundary condition equation [1]

Boundary condition for secondary cooling zone

 Boundary condition
 

  Film Boiling Heat flux

 
Natural Air convection Heat flux
Nucleate Boiling Heat flux
Pool Boiling Heat flux
Surface Temperature
Water Temperature
Ambient Temperature
Water flow rate
 MATLAB Code
Simulation.m
Main body of program HTC_IR.m HTC_FFR.m
Impingement region Free falling region
Boiling curve and BC Boiling curve and BC

PRE1.m Inputs1.m
Domain , mesh, Input variable for
Boundary creation PRE1.m
SOL_A.m contains
MAT_Therm_Prop.
Secondary_Cooling.m
Input_casting.m Primary and secondary cooling
m
Input variable for BC Thermal material
casting parameters propeties

MESH_UPDATE.m Update_BVAL.m Initial_SC_BC.m

Update Boundary Thermal Boundary
Thermal mesh update
condition conditions

Save thermal solution

SOL_THERM.m Post processing:
as T_DB_( i ).mat
files
Thermal solver M_Post_Inter_Thermal.m
Points_Theromcouples.m
 Boiling Curve

   
 

Heat flux [W/m2]

 
Heat flux [W/m2]

Temperature difference [0C] Temperature difference [0C]

Fig a. Impingement region Fig b. Free falling region
↓ Parameters / Regions 🡪 Impingement region Free falling region
Maximum heat flux [W/m2] 7e6 5e6
Departure from nucleate boiling temperature [0C] 180 180
Leidensfrost heat flux [W/m2] 2.6e6 .3e6
 Casting speed and Coolant Flow rate
o Initially 6 second is used to fill bottom block
(i.e., Ingot height h =0 at t=6sec)
Casting o Coolant didn’t touch ingot surface up to 33mm of ingot height
speed
o Impingement region width = 16mm (distance between
Vs
upper and lower impingement point)
Height o Pulsed water flow is used with period 1.5 second for 60mm
To 160mm of ingot height.
(shut down - 36% or 0.54 sec) (on - 64% or 0.96 sec)

Flow
rate
Upper Imp
Vs
Lower Imp
Height

Fig c. pulsed water flow Fig d. Impingement width

 Result : Temperature profile
Surface Surface K4 (150 mm)
K1 Exp K2 Exp
Thermocouple 1 (K1)

Thermocouple 2 (K2)
K1 Sim K2 Sim

K3 (100 mm)

K2 (50 mm)

K1 (20 mm)

Fig a 0
Fig b
Surface
K3 Exp Surface
Thermocouple 3 (K3)

K3 Sim K4 Exp

Thermocouple 4 (K4)
K4 Sim
Result : Temperature profile : animation

(K1 - 20mm) (K3 - 100mm) (Sur - 20mm) (Sur - 100mm)

(K2 - 50mm) (K4 -150 mm) (Sur - 50mm) (Sur -150 mm)

Thermocouple (15mm inside the surface) Surface

Result : Temperature profile : comparison

Thermocouple K1,K2,K3,K4

K2 K1 Sim K3 K1 Exp
K1 K2 K4
K2 Sim K2 Exp
K1 K3
K3 Sim K3 Exp
K4 K4 Sim K4 Exp

SIMULATION EXPERIMENT
 Result : Miscellaneous

K1 K2

K3 K4

Upper imp point

Lower imp point

Fig a. Impingement point temperature vs time Fig b. Maximum heat flux point vs time

o Fig b , Upslope is in impingement region and Downslope is wetting front propagation.

 Result : Temperature : 2D

Fig a. t=147 sec Fig b. t=175 sec Fig c. t=250 sec Fig d. t=400 sec
Conclusion

o Temperature profile from experiment and simulation are almost matching (need a bit work
to match at the end of profile)

o Various cooling difficulties studied like water ejection

o Mechanical modelling can be done based on this thermal modelling in future

Reference

[1] Dr. –Ing. A K Nallathambi PhD Thesis ,Thermomechanical Simulation of Direct Chill Casting

[2] J. Sengupta, S. L. Cockcroft, D. M. Maijer, and A. Larouche, “Quantification of temperature,

stress, and strain fields during the start-up phase of direct chill casting process by using a 3D fully
coupled thermal and stress model for AA5182 ingots”

[3] E. Canon and M.A.Wells, Film boiling and water film ejection in the secondary cooling zone of the
direct chill casting process

[4] A.Sabau, K. Kuwana, S. Viswanathan, K. Saito, and L. Davis, “Heat transfer boundary conditions
for the numerical simulation of the DC casting process

[5] A. Alankar, M. A. Wells, ‘‘Constitutive behavior of as-cast aluminum alloys AA3104, AA5182 and
AA6111 at below solidous temperatures’’,
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