The effect of solidification parameters on dendrite spacing in unidirectional solidification

Abstract

Experiments were carried out in which the conditions of dendritic growth are known, as well as the velocity and direction of solidification, in alloy systems such as Al-Cu, Al-Mg, Al-Zn, Al-Li, Al-Si, Al-Si-Cu, Cu-Zn, Pb-Sn, Sn-Pb and Steel. From these experiments it was determined that the primary dendritic spacing is a function of the temperature gradient, G, and the growth velocity, V, while the secondary and tertiary dendritic spacing are a function of the local solidification time, tSL. In the present work, we investigated the relation proposed by Hunt, Kurz and Fisher and by An and Liu in such alloy systems with dendritic growth, besides that, we correlated secondary and tertiary measured dendritic spacings with the equations proposed by Kattamis et al., Allen and Hunt, Grugel and Feurer for the same alloy systems.