Argonne National Laboratory Reports

In casting, fluidity is the measure of the distance a metal can flow in a channel before being stopped by solidification. During mold filling, the metal loses heat to the surrounding mold, thereby cooling and becoming more viscous until the leading portion solidifies and no further flow is possible. A coupled heat-transfer and fluid-flow modeling of a spiral, involving the use of thermophysical properties to determine material fluidity, has been conducted. Simulations of these experiments utilized the Casting Process Simulator (CaPS) software developed at Argonne National Laboratory. Two types of spiral geometries with different assumptions were considered: (1) a two-dimensional laterally stretched spiral and (2) a three-dimensional lateral spiral. The computer extent of mold filling is in good agreement with the experimental results. Time required by the metal/gas interface to attain specific positions in the spiral arm also compares favorably with the experimental results. The influence of process variables, especially pour time, is discussed. The CaPS software has been used as a computational tool to investigate the validity of the dimensionality assumptions and to evaluate the ability of CaPS to model fluidity adequately