Simulation of stray grain formation during unidirectional solidification of IN738LC superalloy

The influence of casting parameters on stray grain formation of a unidirectionally solidified superalloy IN738LC casting with three platforms was investigated by using a 3D cellular automaton-finite element (CAFE) model in CALCOSOFT package. The model was first validated by comparison of the reported grain structure of Al-7%Si (mass fraction) alloy. Then, the influence of pouring temperature, heat flux of the lateral surface, convection heat coefficient of the cooled chill and mean undercooling of the bulk nucleation on the stray grain formation was studied during the unidirectional solidification. The predictions show that the stray grain formation is obviously sensitive to the pouring temperature, heat flux and mean undercooling of the bulk nucleation. However, increasing the heat convection coefficient has little influence on the stray grain formation.