Flow Instabilities in the Horizontal Single Belt Casting Process with an Inclined Feeding System

Transport phenomena during horizontal single belt casting process using an optimized inclined feeding system

“…At the gap region between the backwall and the horizontal belt, the melt coming from the inclined refractory wall and ambient gas (air) carried by the moving belt, will form a melt–air interface, or meniscus. With previous physical experiments and numerical simulations, the difficulties faced include shrinkage along the width direction, as shown in Figure 4(b) [7]. This shrinkage gives rise to severe deformation (see Region II, Figure 4(b)) once the melt touches against the inclined refractory wall.…”

“…Hitherto, ideally, the liquid metal should be laid down on the belt in an even fashion, at the desired strip width, and thickness. To realize this 'simple' goal, many types of feeding systems have been designed and tested in the past [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. For instance, Salzgitter/Clausthal have developed a simple system involving liquid flow over a double weir system, in which the steel flows onto the belt, and is 'smoothed out', and 'slowed', using impinging jets of argon and electromagnetic braking, so as to produce a liquid layer of steel, approximately 10 mm thick, 1 m wide, that flows at the same velocity as the underlying cooling belt [8].…”

“…It is the successful control of this back meniscus, and the first 10-20 ms of liquid metal contact with the belt, that determines much of the success, or not, of the HSBC [13]. This is because for strip casting, the (a) Schematic view of the inclined feeding system developed for the HSBC process [5,6], and h t is the melt depth, and (b) an aluminium experiment carried out with the inclined feeding system [7].…”

“…In general, depending on how many times the melt jet encounters obstacles, one can classify the feeding system into two types: single impingement and multi-impingements. In the present paper, the inclined feeding system to be analysed belongs to the second category, as it involves two impingements, as illustrated in Figure 4 [7]. With this kind of feeding system, the liquid melt coming from a slot nozzle passes through ambient gas.…”

“…Figure 4. (a) Schematic view of the inclined feeding system developed for the HSBC process[5,6], and h t is the melt depth, and (b) an aluminium experiment carried out with the inclined feeding system[7].…”