Effect of flow modifiers on the fluid flow characteristics in a slab caster tundish

In a slab caster tundish, controlling liquid steel flow is of paramount importance for clean steel production. A conventional tundish design consists of a pouring box, a weir and a dam. To improve the overall performance of a 40 ton slab caster tundish, three different arrangements by incorporating additional flow modifiers have been examined. A three-dimensional steady state fluid flow model has been developed using a RANS (Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes) approach. Subsequently, transient scalar-transport equations were solved to obtain the C-curve of the tundish. A different approach has been followed to evaluate the inlet boundary condition to mimic the process conditions more accurately. The CFD predictions were validated with the results of the water model. Mean residence time, dead volume fraction and flow structures have been considered for evaluating tundish performance. All the proposed configurations have shown improvements in comparison to the base case. The mean residence time of the fluid was found to be the highest for the case having two pairs of weir and dam. However, the insights derived from the flow structures specifically plug flow in zone 2 and near the tundish outlet region suggest that that having a single weir and two dams is the optimal choice.