Numerical Simulation of the Electroslag Casting With Liquid Metal for Producing Composite Roll

The electroslag casting with liquid metal (ESC LM) is a new technology for producing composite roll of high quality based on electroslag metallurgy. In the present work, a two-dimensional quasi-steady state mathematical model of just one half of the ESC LM facility is developed due to the axial symmetry. Influences of operating voltage and pouring temperature on the heat transfer of the composite roll system have been studied. The Lorentz forces and Joule heat are combined with the turbulent flow and energy equations via additional source terms in these equations by the user-defined functions (UDF) based on Fluent software. Simulation results indicate that the distributions of electric potential, current density, Lorentz forces, and Joule heat are concentrated on the upper area of slag bath and a much shallower molten steel pool is obtained. By using the current carrying mold, the heat transfer from slag bath and superheat of the molten steel pool are lower than the conventional ESR process, which is beneficial to a vertical crystallization and an excellent bonding interface between the roll core and working layer of the composite roll. The study of this paper gives us a better understanding of the ESC LM process.