Computational Evolving Technique for Casting Process of Alloys

Abstract

The challenging task of bringing together the advanced computational models (with high accuracy) with reasonable computational time for the practical simulation of industrial process applications has promoted the introduction of innovative numerical methods in recent decades. The time and efforts associated with the accurate numerical simulations of manufacturing processes and the sophisticated multiphysical and multiscale nature of these processes have historically been challenging for mainstream industrial numerical tools. In particular, the numerical simulations of industrial continuous and semicontinuous casting processes for light metal alloys have broadly been reinvigorated to investigate the optimization of casting processes. The development of advanced numerical techniques (e.g., multiscale/physical, finite zoning, and evolving domain techniques) for industrial process simulations including the transient melt flow, heat transfer, and evolution of stress/strain and damage during continuous casting processes have endeavored many new opportunities. However, smarter and broader improvements are needed to capture the underlying physical/chemical phenomena including multiscale/physical transient fluid-thermal-mechanical coupling and dynamic heat-transfer changes during these processes. Within this framework, the cooling system including its fluid flow and its characteristic heat transfer has to be modelled. In the research work herein, numerical studies of a novel transient evolving technique including the thermal-mechanical phenomena and Heat Transfer Coefficient (HTC) estimation using empirical and reverse analyses are presented. The phase change modeling during casting process including liquid/solid interface and also the implementation of dynamic HTC curves are also considered. One of the main contributions of this paper is to show the applicability and reliability of the newly developed evolving numerical simulation approach for in-depth investigations of continuous casting processes.

Dynamic Simulations of Manufacturing Processes: Hybrid-Evolving Technique

“…The optimization of different industrial processes including, casting, extrusion, forging, and rolling have long been considered, and many technical\economic advantages on the one hand and also difficult technical challenges, on the other hand, have been examined. The use of numerical simulations for optimizing these processes has undoubtedly gained popularity in the last couple of decades and new and innovative methods have been developed to be a part of design-optimize-verify processes or even used as a part of real-time monitoring and automation in the production lines [7][8][9][10][11]. The FE and CFD solvers have traditionally been utilized for these material process simulations where multi-physical\phase and multi-scale aspects of the material evolutions have been considered.…”

“…For dynamic systems, it is essential to have a strategy to evolve the numerical domain according to the real pace of the manufacturing process which ultimately delivers a dynamic and growing computational domain. The proposed DMT technique can deliver a method where accurate results can be obtained using growing and evolving domains [4,9,11]. The computational resources for this technique are commissioned gradually as the size of the real billet and its simulated counterpart are growing during the process.…”

“…While both techniques have employed contact elements to simulate the cooling boundaries (air and water cooling), for BT, the contacts had to be set up for the full length of the billet. Alternatively, for DMT, as new mesh layers are generated and attached to the main domain at solver restarts, contact setups needed to be updated [4,9,11].…”

On Numerical Simulation of Casting in New Foundries: Dynamic Process Simulations

“…The new approach towards simulation of foundry casting processes has recently been proposed using innovative dynamic mesh generation and process-controlled solver restarts [18][19][20][21][22][23]. The concept of zonal mesh evolution, where a block of new elements is inserted into the growing numerical domain at restarts, is implemented and a scheme for material and energy input/balancing is developed [18].…”

“…The new approach towards simulation of foundry casting processes has recently been proposed using innovative dynamic mesh generation and process-controlled solver restarts [18][19][20][21][22][23]. The concept of zonal mesh evolution, where a block of new elements is inserted into the growing numerical domain at restarts, is implemented and a scheme for material and energy input/balancing is developed [18]. The application of the technique for industrial semi-continuous casting and Additive Manufacturing (AM) processes have already been investigated where the dynamically growing domains are modelled using appended mesh.…”