Title: Computationally efficient numerical technique for primary cooling zone of thin slab continuous casting

Authors: Niloy K. Nath, Smita Kamble

Addresses: Department of Metallurgy and Materials Science, College of Engineering Pune, Pune – 411005, India. ' Department of Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore – 560012, India

Abstract: Thin slab continuous casting process can be controlled by the water flow rate through the copper mould to obtain the proper shell thickness for a given casting speed. To achieve this, 2D model for the liquid metal flow in the strand and water flow through the mould is developed using stream function and vorticity formulation. The main advantage is faster computation, which is very important for process optimisation, and real-time modelling for process control. The funnel type shape of the mould is efficiently taken into consideration by using body fitted coordinate system. The detailed CFD-based model can be used for analysing the process parameters and variables like heat transfer through the mould flux, casting speed and superheat. The model can be easily adapted for wide range of casting process like slab and billet casting and thin strip casting.

Keywords: thin slab casting; stream function; vorticity; primary cooling zone; mould flux; shell thickness; continuous casting; water flow rate; copper mould; shell thickness; casting speed; 2D modelling; liquid metal flow; CFD; computational fluid dynamics; heat transfer.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESMS.2010.038140

International Journal of Engineering Systems Modelling and Simulation, 2010 Vol.2 No.4, pp.211 - 216

Published online: 19 Jan 2011 *

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