Análisis de Flujos con Superficie Libre en Problemas Industriales

Abstract

During the continuous casting of steel, in steel industry, the molten metal circulates through a series of vessels before solidifYing and taking its final shape. The characteristics of the flow inside these vessels affect the quality of the final product.
This motivates the study of the fluid dynamics of the continuous casting process. In this work the flow inside a slab mold. and inside a ladle is analyzed with particular attention to the free surface behaviour.
A turbulent incompressible fluid is considered. The finite element method is used to solve the equations. Incompressibility condition is imposed by penalizatioo and the
twbulence is modeled by the mixing length model or the k-e model. Free surface position is estimated by the pseudoconcentration teobnique.
The numerical model was validated with measurements taken from literature performed on a water model of a slabs mold. Finally, results from the vortex formation during a ladle drainage are presented.