Acta Metallurgica Sinica (English Letters) ›› 2009, Vol. 22 ›› Issue (6): 408-414.DOI: 10.1016/S1006-7191(08)60116-7

• Research paper • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Annular electromagnetic stirring-a new method for the production of semi-solid A357 aluminum alloy slurry

Guanglei ZHU, Jun XU, Zhifeng ZHANG, Yuelong BAI, Likai SHI   

  1. National Engineering & Technology Research Center for Non-ferrous Metal Matrix Composites, General Research Institute for Non-ferrous Metals, Beijing 100088, China
  • Received:2009-01-04 Revised:2009-03-14 Online:2009-12-25 Published:2009-12-16
  • Contact: Guanglei ZHU

Abstract:

A new method for producing semisolid slurry, annular electromagnetic stirring (A-EMS), to refine and spheroidize grains was exploited. Experimental work was undertaken to investigate the effects of cooling rate, stirring power and stirring time on the solidification behavior of A357 alloy using A-EMS. It was found that increasing the cooling rate and stirring power gave rise to substantial grain refinement, which could be attributed to the increase of effective nucleation rate caused by the extremely uniform temperature and composition fields in the bulk liquid during the initial stage of solidification. Results showed that a fully grain refined spherical structure could be obtained using proper processing conditions within 10s.

Key words: Semisolid, Annular electromagnetic stirring, A357