Energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, environmental impact levels, and the availability of materials as well as their sustainable usage are all topics of high current interest. The energy intensive processes of casting production such as heat treatment are particularly affected by the pursuit of sustainability. It has been estimated that up to 20% of the total energy demand in a non-ferrous foundry is required to provide the heat energy necessary during heat treatment processes. This paper addresses the application-oriented development of a sustainable configuration of the heat treatment process at the example of the aluminium-casting alloy A356 (AlSi7Mg0.3). Based on calculations of the physically necessary operating modes and under investigation of previous parameter recommendations, experimental studies were carried out to investigate the effects of various heat treatment parameters on the ultimate mechanical properties of the alloy. Since the achievable mechanical properties of the finished casting are decisive, the static and dynamic casting properties resulting from the heat treatment with optimized process parameters were compared with those of conventional process control. Significant optimization potential is shown for reducing the treatment time and thus lowering the energy consumption.
Ultrasonic treatment (UST) and its effects, primarily cavitation and acoustic streaming, are useful for a high range of industrial applications, e.g., welding, filtering, cleaning or emulsification. In the metallurgy and foundry industry, UST can be used to modify a material’s microstructure by treating metal in the liquid or semi-solid state. Cavitation (formation, pulsating growth and implosion of tiny bubbles) and its shock waves, released during the implosion of the cavitation bubbles, are able to break forming structures and thus refine them. In this context, especially aluminium alloys are in the focus of the investigations. Aluminium alloys, e.g., A356, have a significantly wide range of industrial applications in automotive, aerospace and machine engineering, and UST is an effective and comparatively clean technology for its treatment. In recent years, the efforts for simulating the complex mechanisms of UST are increasing, and approaches for computing the complex cavitation dynamics below the radiator during high intensity ultrasonic treatment have come up. In this study, the capabilities of the established CFD simulation tool FLOW-3D to simulate the formation and dynamics of acoustic cavitation in aluminium A356 are investigated. The achieved results demonstrate the basic capability of the software to calculate the above-mentioned effects. Thus, the investigated software provides a solid basis for further development and integration of numerical models into an established software environment and could promote the integration of the simulation of UST in industry.
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