Full Coupled Numerical Simulations of the Continuous Casting Process with Electromagnetic Braking for Slabs and Thin Slabs

Description

n the continuous casting of slabs and thin slabs electromagnetic brakes are commonly used to modify the flow in the fluid core of the strand. Because the flow plays an important role for the quality of the product, optimization of the flow structure is very important. Electromagnetic brakes are able to brake or channel the submerged jets as well as dampen vortices occurring at the impingement point of the jet. Electromagnetic brakes at the meniscus level ensure an optimal velocity near the meniscus. In the present work the electromagnetic braking is studied by means of numerical simulations. Due to the harsh environment at the steel plant measurements are rather difficult to perform. Physical 1:1 scaled models of the casting process can not be used because of the low conductivity of water. If liquid metals are used, measurements are rather complicated due to the opacity of the metals or their treatment. Thus numerical simulations are nearly irreplaceable means to get detailed information of the flow field under the influence of an electromagnetic brake. The interaction between the fields is considered by full coupling methods. While the liquid steel flow is simulated with the commercial code FLUENT, two different approaches for the magnetic field simulation are presented. To calculate the electromagnetic field, one approach uses the FLUENT MHD add-on module. In the other approach the electromagnetic field is calculated with the finite element code ANSYS EMAG. The coupling between these two solvers is done with MpCCI, which administrates the simulation and the data exchange between the solvers. The approaches are compared to each other in view of the accuracy of the results, their performance and the computational costs.

Period	29 Jun 2011
Event title	4th International Conference on Modelling and Simulation of Metallurgical Processes in Steelmaking
Event type	Conference
Location	GermanyShow on map