Evaluating the heat transfer phenomena and the interfacial thermal resistance of mold flux using a copper disc mold simulator

The new modified pouring method (copper disc mold simulator, CDMS) to investigate the interfacial thermal resistance and crystallinity for the mold fluxes was introduced. To make sure the formation of the air gap, the surface waviness was measured with the crystallinity. The interfacial thermal resistance increased with higher average waviness, which means the average height of air gap. However, the average waviness did not increase with the higher crystallinity. This result came from the different crystallization mechanisms and the contraction of the flux during the solidification and crystallization was varied based on the crystallization mechanism. Therefore, it is important to apply the mold flux which has optimum crystallization behavior because applying the strong crystallized mold flux to increase the interfacial thermal resistance does not always bring the high interfacial thermal resistance. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.