Authors: B Ravi
Publish Date: 2012/10/13
Volume: 65, Issue: 6, Pages: 521-525
Abstract
Metal casting solidification is accompanied by volumetric shrinkage compensated by microscopic flow of liquid from adjacent hotter regions along the direction of the highest temperature gradients referred to as feedpaths The feedpaths converge to local hot spots which lead to shrinkage porosity defects Ideally hot spots should be inside feeders implying shrinkage defectfree castings Visualization of 3D feedpaths facilitates analyzing and optimizing the design of feeders to obtain the desired quality at the highest possible yield We present our work in this area spanning the last two decades starting from Modulus Vector Method in 2D 1988 and 3D 1996 Vector Element Method 2006 and Gradient Vector Method 2012 The melt is assumed to be stationary and convection effects are neglected It is mainly applicable to thickwalled castings poured under gravity in sand molds The feedpath computation has been incorporated in an integrated casting design software and validated on several industrial case studiesProf MN Srinivasan provided the initial insight that led to the development of the vector methods Many research students and associates helped in software development Ramesh Dommeti and Koustubh Moharir deserve special mention Feedback from foundry engineers and knowledge shared by casting consultants helped in continuous improvement of the technology over the last two decades All these contributions are gratefully acknowledged
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