A Numerical Investigation into the Effect of Thermal Shrinkage and Solidification Shrinkage on the Microstructure and Macrosegregation for Continuous Casting Billet

As a typical metallurgical defect, macrosegregation seriously affects the internal quality of the continuous casting billet, and it cannot be solved by processes such as high-temperature diffusion and rolling. For continuous casting billet, the solidification shrinkage and thermal shrinkage of the microstructure directly affect the macrosegregation defect. In order to reveal the effects of solidification shrinkage and thermal shrinkage on the melt flow, microstructure distribution, and solute segregation, a multiphase solidification model based on the Eulerian–Eulerian approach was established in this work. The growth behaviors of the columnar dendrite trunk and the columnar dendrite tip were fully considered, as well as the nucleation, growth, free migration of equiaxed grains, and the columnar-to-equiaxed transition (CET). Besides, the corresponding relationship between the secondary dendrite arm spacing (SDAS) and the cooling rate has also been taken into account in the model, which makes the net mass transport source term of the mass conservation equations more accurate. The calculation results show that when no any shrinkage behavior is considered in the model, the melt flow velocity in front of the solidification end will gradually decrease until it is the same as the casting speed, and the segregation index at the billet center will gradually increase until it reaches the maximum value at the solidification end. Both thermal shrinkage and solidification shrinkage can generate a negative pressure zone in the billet center, sucking the poor-solute melt located the upstream of continuous casting strand flows towards the solidification end, and mixing with the enriched-solute melt before the solidification end, thereby inhibiting macrosegregation. However, compared with the solidification shrinkage, the effect of thermal shrinkage on reducing the positive segregation index in the billet center is limited.