Heat flow parameters affecting the unidirectional solidification of pure metals

Unidirectional solidification of pure metals has been studied as a function of liquid superheat, heat transfer coefficient of the metal/mold interface(h _i ), and mold material. Experimental results show that the position of the solid/liquid interface (X) varies with time (l) following the relationshipX(t) = A . t ^1/2 -B, where, for a fixed metal,B is a constant only dependent on the superheat through a parabolic law andA is another constant that is independent of the superheat but dependent on the mold heat sink capacity,i.e., mold material and coefficienth _i At the same time, it has been calculated that the constantA varies withh _i through an error-function type law tending asymptotically to Lyubov’s exact analytic solution.