Simulation of dendritic growth of magnesium alloys with fluid flow

Fluid flow has a significant impact on the microstructure evolution of alloys during solidification. Based on the previous work relating simulation of the dendritic growth of magnesium alloys with hcp (hexagonal close-packed) structure, an extension was made to the formerly established CA (cellular automaton) model with the purpose of studying the effect of fluid flow on the dendritic growth of magnesium alloys. The modified projection method was used to solve the transport equations of flow field. By coupling the flow field with the solute field, simulation results of equiaxed and columnar dendritic growth of magnesium alloys with fluid flow were achieved. The simulated results were quantitatively compared with those without fluid flow. Moreover, a comparison was also made between the present work and previous works conducted by others. It can be concluded that a deep understanding of the dendritic growth of magnesium alloys with fluid flow can be obtained by applying the present numerical model.