The Sensibility of Thermophysical Property Data for Simulating Casting Processes

The numerical simulation of casting processes is finding a steadily growing acceptance in the foundry industry worldwide. Advanced computer technologies like MAGMASOFT® have turned out to be powerful tools for continuous process optimization. The availability of accurate thermophysical data for all material groups in the whole casting system is a very important aspect in this coIntext, as the simulation results used to analyze the casting process are very much dependent on the material data applied. Especially with sand mold materials, the definition of thermophysical properties becomes more complicated, as they exhibit a nonreversible behavior during the process due to the thermal decomposition of the binder materials and the evaporation of the water contained in the sand. Hence, the cooling power of the mold will be stronger during the heating cycle at the beginning of the process and weaker at the end when the system is cooling again. For iron castings, showing a solid-state phase transformation after an extended cooling time in the mold, this aspect may become very important. This paper gives an insight into the required accuracy of the thermophysical properties by analytical and numerical methods, using the MAGMASOFT® simulation code.