A Study on Solidification Behavior of a Large Round Bloom Affected by Swirling Flow Submerged Entry Nozzle Combined with Mold Electromagnetic Stirring

Three-dimensional mathematical model was established to investigate the solidification behavior during the continuous casting of a round bloom with the diameter of 0.7 m, where a novel swirling flow submerged entry nozzle (SEN) combined with mold electromagnetic stirring (M-EMS) method was used. The results show that an impinging flow phenomenon, which was normally formed in conventional single-port SEN casting, was effectively eliminated by adopting the new method. Molten steel from the swirling flow SEN port uniformly moved to the solidification front, which improved the dissipation rate of molten steel super-heat. When the rotational direction of the swirling flow in SEN was in the same direction as M-EMS, the super-heat of molten steel in mold can be decreased by 5 K, compared to the use of a conventional SEN with M-EMS. As the current intensity decreased from 310 to 100 A, the super-heat of molten steel in the mold center region was reduced by 3 K. This is due to that the shielding effect of M-EMS on rotational flow momentum from the swirling flow SEN became weak as the stirring intensity decreased. In addition, molten steel temperature near the meniscus under the current intensity of 310 and 100 A was 1787 K and 1790 K, respectively. The solidified shell thickness obtained by using 100 A current intensity was about 1 x 10-3 m larger than that of 310 A current intensity.