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Process Diagnosis of Liquid Steel Flow in a Slab Mold Operated with a Slide Valve

Slab molds receive liquid steel from the tundish through bifurcated submerged entry nozzles (SEN) using a slide valve as throughput control. Due to the off-centering position of the three plates’ orifices that conform to the valve to control the steel passage, the flow inside the nozzle and mold is inherently biased toward the valve opening side. In the practical casting, a biased flow induces inhomogeneous heat fluxes through the mold copper plates. The nozzle design itself is also a challenge, and has direct consequences on the quality of the product. A diagnosis of the casting process regarding the internal and external flows, performed through experimental and mathematical simulation tools, made it possible to reach concrete results. The mathematical simulations predicted the flow dynamics, and the topography and levels variations of the meniscus characterized through a full-scale water model. The flows are biased, and the meniscus level fluctuations indicated that the current nozzle is not reliable to cast at the two extremes of the casting speeds of 0.9 m/min and 1.65 m/min, due to the danger of mold flux entrainment. A redesign of the nozzle is recommended, based on the experimental and mathematical results presented here.