Optimization of Narrow-Face Water Slot Design for the Siderar Slab Casting Mold

摘要

The existing narrow face design does not produce excessive temperatures anywhere in the mold. The maximum temperature, found at the hotface corner, is 283°C for the conditions studied. However, this corner is about 50°C hotter than the center, so a gradient exists across the hotface. An accurate equation was developed to predict corner temperature as a function of casting conditions (hot face heat flux) and water slot geometry. Redesign #1A, which deepens the angled slot from 20 to 25 mm results in lowering the corner temperature to 256°C and improves theoretical hotface uniformity to a variation of only 26°C. If taper is optimal (such that no gaps are formed near the corner and hotface heat flux is relatively uniform), then this redesign should result in slightly improved mold life, less crushing of the corner, and possibly fewer quality problems, such as longitudinal off-corner cracks, due to the hotface temperature nonuniformities. Several other water slot geometry redesigns (1-5) were investigated which further improved potential hot face temperature uniformity, at the expense of increasing complexity of the water slot redesign.