Equiaxed dendritic growth in nearly isothermal conditions: A study combining in situ and real-time experiment with large-scale phase-field simulation

Abstract

The equiaxed dendritic growth of Al-Cu alloys in nearly isothermal temperature field under continuous cooling condition is studied using in situ and real-time observation of experiments by synchrotron X-ray radiography and large-scale quantitative two-dimensional (2D) phase-field (PF) simulations. It is revealed that the equiaxed dendritic morphology and the secondary dendritic arm spacing (SDAS) in the 2D PF simulations are in a reasonable agreement with the experimental data. Increasing the cooling rates results in a smaller SDAS, as predicted by the analytical Kattamis-Flemings model. The transformation kinetics of solid fraction can be described by the Johnson-Mehl-Avrami-Kologoromov (JMAK) theory, but quantitative differences between the experiments and 2D PF simulations are significant. The maximum solute concentration Cmax in liquid is approximately equal to the equilibrium concentration, which depends on the undercooling rather than the cooling rate. But the minimum solute concentration Cmin in solid decreases with the cooling rate, thus leading to a larger segregation ratio SR = Cmax/Cmin. Moreover, the liquid gravity-driven natural convection is considered in simulations. The liquid flow slightly increases the SDAS but has no apparent effect on solid fraction, and the segregation ratio is slightly reduced by the liquid convection, which could be attributed to the almost same Cmax and enlarged Cmin.