Open Access

ARTICLE

Influence of Thermocapillary Convection on Solid-liquid Interface

by K. Matsunaga¹, H. Kawamura¹

1 Dept. Mech. Eng., Faculty of Sci. & Tech., Tokyo University of Science, Tokyo, Japan

Fluid Dynamics & Materials Processing 2006, 2(1), 59-64. https://doi.org/10.3970/fdmp.2006.002.059

Abstract

Existing studies on solidification phenomena mainly focused on the solidification processes per se. In real systems, however, one cannot neglect the effects of molten material convective flow, such as natural and thermocapillary convection (they strongly affect the resulting quality of the solidified materials). The present study aims to experimentally investigate on the effect of the thermocapillary flow upon the directional solidification in a liquid layer with a free upper surface. If no free surface exists, the solid--liquid interface (SLI) is vertical and straight, while, with the free surface, the SLI is inclined against the wall-normal direction and is curved in the growth direction due to thermocapillary convection. The dendrite tip, which is parabolic in a stagnant liquid, is deformed asymmetrically due to surface flow. The secondary dendrite arm is larger in the inflow direction of convection. It is also found that even if the growth rate of the SLI near the top and bottom surface is the same at equilibrium, there exists a distinct difference in the solidification morphology.

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Keywords

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