Effect of abruptly changing withdrawal rate on solidification microstructure in directionally solidified Al-4.5wt%Cu alloy

Al-4.5wt.%Cu alloy has been directionally solidified at constant and abruptly changing withdrawal rates, respectively. The effects of the withdrawal rate on solidification microstructure, primary dendrite arm spacing(PDAS) and liquid solute distribution in front of the solid-liquid interface were investigated. The experimental results for the PDAS at a constant withdrawal rate agree well with the values calculated by the Hunt, Trivedi and Hunt-Lu models. At an abrupt change in the withdrawal rate, the maximum to minimum ratio of the PDAS at a given solidification parameter, i.e. λ1max/λ1min, is more than 2, and the PDAS values are remarkably history-dependent. Further, the liquid-solute distribution curve based on theoretical calculation shows that the larger the initial withdrawal rate is, the smaller the minimum of liquid solute concentration in front of the solid-liquid interface is after the abrupt change in withdrawal rate.

Feature study of body-fitted Cartesian grids used in casting numerical simulation

A type of mesh called a body-fi tted Cartesian mesh,very different from the traditional structured body-fi tted mesh,is established.At f irst,the right parallelepiped mesh is generated,then,a feature analysis is done on the cross sections.These cross sections are the intersections of the casting shape with the right parallelepiped grids(under the Cartesian coordinate system).On the basis of the feature analysis,two sorts of body-f itted boundary grids,shape-keeping grids and shape-distortion grids,are def ined.Shape-distortion grids can be removed or weaken by increasing the number of grids or moving the coordinates of the mesh generation region,so actually the body-fitted Cartesian mesh generation is to get shape-keeping grids.A shape-keeping grid mainly consists of two sorts of surfaces(I type face and II type face),and each of them is joined by two types of points(I type point and II type point).If only these two types of points were given,the shape-keeping mesh would be constructed.In this paper,the cases of the above two boundary grids being generated were discussed.An algorithm was put forward to get the shape-keeping grids.Several body-fi tted Cartesian meshes generated on castings show the validity of the algorithm.The mesh generation examples show that the body-fi tted Cartesian mesh is more excellent than the right parallelepiped mesh in aspects of decreasing grids number and being closer to the shape of the casting solid.

Elimination of turned dendrite in laser multilayer deposition of Rene88DT superalloy on DD3 single crystal

Laser multilayer deposition of Rene88DT superalloy on DD3 single-crystal substrate is conducted.The influences of the crystal orientation of the substrate and the profile of the solid/liquid interface of the molten pool on the deposited microstructure are investigated.A unique strategy is proposed by adjusting the angle between the substrate surface and the substrate crystal orientation.This approach prevents the formation of the turned dendrite,thus obtaining a fully directional microstructure in the deposits.