Near-Net Shape Continuous Casting of Aluminum Alloy Billet Using Electromagnetic Field

摘要

The present study investigates on the continuous casting of near-net shape aluminum billet using electromagnetic casting and stirring technology.Traditional machine for continuous casting process involves round,square and rectangular billets;therefore it requires additional multistep forging process to fabricate final products.A new process for the designed free-shaped billets offers some advantages:the process of extrusion and forging is simplified and the cost of plastic working can be greatly reduced.In order to reduce the peculiar problems such as surface crack and internal defect due to inhomogeneous heat transfer through solidified billets,electromagnetic casting and stirring technique were adopted.Through the numerical computer simulation,we have calculated the slit design of the free-shaped mold.The free-shaped aluminum billet was continuously cast at the various casting speed and coil current of about 1,200A.Breakout velocity and melt pool depth were measured.Surface and microstructure of the free-shape aluminum billet using EMC and EMS techniques were compared with those of the billet using the conventional DC casting.