Solidification microstructure of M2 high speed steel by different casting technologies

The present work investigated the solidification microstructure of AISI M2 high speed steel manufactured by different casting technologies, namely iron mould casting and continuous casting. The results revealed that the as-cast structure of the steel was composed of the iron matrix and the M2C eutectic carbide networks, which were greatly refined in the ingot made by continuous casting process, compared with that by the iron mould casting process. M2C eutectic carbides presented variation in their morphologies and growth characteristics in the ingots by both casting methods. In the ingot by iron mould casting, they have a plate-like morphology and grow anisotropically. However, in the ingot made by continuous casting, the carbides evolved into the fiber-like shape that exhibited little characteristics of anisotropic growth. It was noticed that the fiber-like M2C was much easier to decompose and spheroidize after heated, as a result, the carbides refined remarkably, compared with the case of plate-like carbides in the iron mould casting ingot.

Construction and analysis of dynamic solidification curves for non-equilibrium solidification process in lost-foam casting hypoeutectic gray cast iron

Most lost-foam casting processes involve non-equilibrium solidification dominated by kinetic factors, while construction of a common dynamic solidification curve is based on pure thermodynamics, not applicable for analyses and research of non-equilibrium macro-solidification processes, and the construction mode can not be applied to nonequilibrium solidification process. In this study, the construction of the dynamic solidification curve(DSC) for the nonequilibrium macro-solidification process included: a modified method to determine the start temperature of primary austenite precipitation(T_(AL)) and the start temperature of eutectic solidification(T_(ES)); double curves method to determine the temperature of the dendrite coherency point of primary austenite(T-(AC)) and the temperature of eutectic cells collision point(T_(EC)); the "technical solidus" method to determine the end temperature of eutectic reaction(T_(EN)). For this purpose, a comparative testing of the non-equilibrium solidification temperature fields in lost-foam casting and green sand mold casting hypoeutectic gray iron was carried out. The thermal analysis results were used to construct the DSCs of both these casting methods under non-equilibrium solidification conditions. The results show that the transformation rate of non-equilibrium solidification in hypoeutectic gray cast iron is greater than that of equilibrium solidification. The eutectic solidification region presents a typical mushy solidification mode. The results also indicate that the primary austenite precipitation zone of lost-foam casting is slightly larger than that of green sand casting. At the same time, the solid fraction(f_s) of the dendrite coherency points in lost-foam casting is greater than that in the green sand casting. Therefore, from these two points, lost-foam casting is more preferable for reduction of shrinkage and mechanical burntin sand tendency of the hypoeutectic gray cast iron. Due to the fact that the solidification process(from the surface to center) at primary austenite growth area in the lost-foam cylinder sample lags behind that in the green sand casting, the mushy solidification tendency of lost-foam casting is greater and the solidification time is longer.

Effect of carbon additions on the microstructure of a single crystal Ni-based superalloy AM3

The microstructure of experimental nickel-base single crystal superalloys with different levels of carbon has been studied. The results indicated that with increasing carbon addition, the liquidus temperature decreased obviously and the as-cast microstructures exhibited a decrease in the amount of γ/γ′ eutectic structure and an increase in the volume fraction of carbides. The carbides formed in these alloys were most script-type MC carbides which appeared continuous dendritic networks in the interdendritic region. The segregation behavior of element W was influenced by the carbon addition.

Molar volume of eutectic solvents as a function of molar composition and temperature

The conventional Rackett model for predicting liquid molar volume has been modified to cater for the effect of molar composition of the Deep Eutectic Solvents(DES). The experimental molar volume data for a group of commonly used DES has been used for optimizing the improved model. The data involved different molar compositions of each DES. The validation of the new model was performed on another set of DESs. The average relative deviation of the model on the training and validation datasets was approximately 0.1% while the Rackett model gave a relative deviation of more than 1.6%. The modified model deals with variations in DES molar composition and temperature in a more consistent way than the original Rackett model which exhibits monotonic performance degradation as temperature moves away from reference conditions. Having the composition of the DES as a model variable enhances the practical utilization of the predicting model in diverse design and process simulation applications.

Solid–liquid equilibrium of dimethyl terephthalate(DMT), dimethyl isophthalate(DMI) and dimethyl phthalate(DMP) in melt crystallization process

The binary solid–liquid equilibrium of Dimethyl Terephthalate(DMT), Dimethyl Isophthalate(DMI) and Dimethyl Phthalate(DMP) was investigated by experiment and differential scanning calorimetry(DSC). The result demonstrated DMT/DMI and DMT/DMP systems are eutectic while DMI/DMP is a solid-solution system. The eutectic temperature of DMT/DMI system is 336.7 K and that of DMT/DMP is 271.1 K. Furthermore, a classical solid–liquid phase equilibrium model was used to fit the experimental data of the eutectic systems of DMT/DMI and DMT/DMP and the theoretical model could describe the eutectic solid–liquid phase diagrams properly.

Viscosity of aqueous ionic liquids analogues as a function of water content and temperature

Ionic liquids analogues known as Deep Eutectic Solvents(DESs) are gaining a surge of interest by the scientific community, and many applications involving DESs have been realized. Moisture content is one of the important factors that affects the physical and chemical characteristics of these fluids. In this work, the effect of mixing water with three common type III DESs on their viscosity was investigated within the water mol fraction range of(0–1) and at the temperature range(298.15–353.15 K). Similar trends of viscosity variation with respect to molar composition and temperature were observed for the three studied systems. Due to the asymmetric geometry of the constituting molecules in these fluids, their viscosity could not be modeled effectively by the conventional Grunberg and Nissan model, and the Fang–He model was used to address this issue with excellent performance. All studied aqueous DES mixtures showed negative deviation in viscosity as compared to ideal mixtures. The degree of intermolecular interactions with water reaches a maximum at a composition of 30%aqueous DES solution. Reline, the most studied DES in the literature, showed the highest deviation. The information presented in this work on the viscosity of aqueous DES solutions may serve in tuning this important property for diverse industrial applications involving these novel fluids in fluid flow, chemical reactions, liquid–liquid separation and many more.

Effect of phosphor addition on eutectic solidification and microstructure of an Al-13%Si alloy

As the refiner or modifier, the master alloys containing high concentration phosphor are widely used in preparing eutectic or hypereutectic Al-Si alloys. To study the effect of phosphor addition on the eutectic solidification and microstructure of the Al-13%Si alloy, an investigation has been undertaken by means of thermal analysis and micro/macro-structure observation. Results indicate that addition of phosphor in near eutectic Al-Si alloy promotes the nucleation of eutectic but has little refinement impact on primary Si particles as expected. Conversely, both primary Si particles and eutectic Si flakes become slightly coarser in P-rich alloys. The coarsening of eutectic Si flakes ties closely to the increased eutectic growth temperature with phosphor addition. The eutectic solidification of the alloy proceeds from the near mold zone towards the center, and it is also found that a few independent nucleation regions emerge in liquid at the solidification front due to the addition of phosphor.