Solidification of a Binary Solution (NH4Cl+H2O) on an Inclined Cooling Plate: A Parametric Study

Abstract

A parametric study on the solidification behaviour of a binary solution (NH4Cl + H2O) on inclined cooling plate is presented numerically. During solidification of the solution, a shear layer is developed in the mush where a part of the dendrites is fragmented under shear flow and transported into the bulk solution. Accordingly, a slurry layer is found over the mush. The present solidification behaviour primarily depends on inclination angle of the plate and composition of the solution. In the present work, a mathematical model is developed where the free surface of solution is represented by the volume-of-fluid (VOF) method and the solidification behaviour is represented by a set of volume averaged single phase mass, momentum, energy, species conservation equations. The Stokes model is used to represent the solid velocity. The governing equations are solved based on the pressure-based finite volume method according to the SIMPLER algorithm using TDMA solver along with the enthalpy update scheme. The final simulation predicts the effect of process parameters on temperature, velocity, solid fraction and the species distributions.