Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711

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Journal of Materials Processing Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jmatprotec

A novel technique for reducing macrosegregation in heavy steel ingots

Baoguang Sang, Xiuhong Kang, Dianzhong Li ∗
Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science, Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 72 Wenhua Road, Shenyang 110016, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Solid steel balls were added to the melt during the pouring process. A reference 500 kg steel ingot with
Received 11 August 2009 no addition of solid balls was poured to provide a realistic comparison with the typical macrosegregation
Received in revised form found in conventional industry heavy ingots. The experiments show that by adding solid balls the degree
15 December 2009
of macrosegregation is reduced, the formation of A-type segregation is prevented, a generally refined
Accepted 15 December 2009
microstructure is obtained and the mechanical properties are improved. Numerical simulation of the
solidification process confirms that the addition of solid balls increases the cooling rate, imposing large
temperature gradient which refine the microstructure and alleviate the extent of macrosegregation.
Keywords:
Macrosegregation © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Steel balls
Heavy steel ingot
Numerical simulation

1. Introduction
Macrosegregation is a deviation from the average composition
over distances much larger than the dendrite arm spacing. It has a
detrimental impact on the properties of ingots and is not possible to
eliminate by thermo-mechanical post-treatments. Therefore, novel
methods of effectively reducing macrosegregation are required to
meet future requirements for high quality, heavy forgings such as
the rotor shafts of large electricity generating plant.
Suzuki and Taniguchi (1981) measured the mobility of interden-
dritic liquid metal during solidification. The experimental results
obtained indicated that A-segregates could be reduced by low-
ering the Si content and raising the Mo content to reduce the
buoyancy of the liquid, and so remove the fundamental driving
force for the segregation. However, this method is not applicable
to all ingots, especially those with stringent requirements of the Si
content. Griffiths and McCartney (1997) studied the effect of elec-
tromagnetic stirring on macrostructure and macrosegregation in
the aluminium alloy 7150 and found that the macrosegregation
is less pronounced in an ingot solidified in a low-frequency elec-
tromagnetic field. But, at present, this method seems impractical
for large diameter steel ingots. The multi-pouring (MP) tech-
nique proposed by Tateno (1985) is widely adopted for controlling
macrosegregation in practice. But this method is limited by the fact
that the pouring time must be long enough to allow time for suffi-
cient solidification, reducing the intermixing of compositions from
different ladles. The method is not easily applicable to ingots cast
in vacuum. Moreover, the precise control of the pouring time is also
not easy.
Accordingly, the effective reduction of the macrosegregation
during the solidification of large ingots remains a demanding chal-
lenge of scientific and technological importance. It is generally
acknowledged that the macrosegregation is caused by the relative
movement of the segregated liquid and solid during a slow freez-
ing course as reported by Brody and Flemings (1966). Suzuki and
Miyamoto (1978) derived the critical thermal conditions for the A-
type segregation formation in a 0.7% C steel. It seems that the key
factor reducing segregation is the speed of the solidification pro-
cess, permitting less time for fluid transport. Both the solutal and
thermal buoyancy forces lose their ability to significantly affect the
fluid flow. However, the history of attempted developments in this
quest shows that this is easier said than done.
In this paper, a new technique is proposed for macrosegregation
reduction in heavy steel ingots. It is characterized by the addition
of steel balls (with a composition similar to that of the melt) during
the pouring process. A steel ingot with no addition was poured
as a baseline comparison, exhibiting the typical macrosegregation
found in conventional industry heavy steel ingots (Lesoult, 2005).
Microstructures and mechanical properties of the two ingots were
compared. Numerical simulation was carried out to investigate the
changes to the temperature field, fluid flow and secondary dendrite
arm spacing (SDAS). The application of solid steel balls to control
macrosegregation is seen to have important potential.

2. Experimental procedure

∗ Corresponding author. The liquid metal of the two ingots examined is of the same ladle.
E-mail address: dzli@imr.ac.cn (D. Li). The ladle composition is shown in Table 1. The characteristics and

0924-0136/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2009.12.010
704 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of (a) the ingot and mold with all dimensions in millimeter and (b) the way of adding steel balls.

Table 1 Table 2
Ladle composition of the ingot (wt%). Chemical composition of the steel balls (wt%).

C Si Mn S P Fe C Si Mn S P Fe

0.45 0.20 0.51 ≤0.02 ≤0.02 Balance 0.35 0.30 0.57 ≤0.024 ≤0.021 Balance

illustrated schematically in Fig. 1(b), addition of steel balls through

dimensions of the ingot are displayed in Fig. 1(a). The ingots were
the conical funnel started when the level of the molten metal rose
each 500 kg, with an ingot-body height of 650 mm, an upper diam-
to 1/4 of the height of the ingot, and was continued steadily until
eter of 360 mm, and a lower diameter of 280 mm. The feeder was
the liquid reached the feeder.
150 mm high with an average diameter of 340 mm. The mold cav-
The ingots were sectioned along the centerline and machined
ity was coated with 0.5–0.7 mm-thick magnesite clinker to gain a
flat by milling. The milled surface was then prepared for metallurgi-
good insulation effect for the ingot. The mold was preheated to
cal examination by grinding and polishing. The surface was etched
60 ◦ C to minimize any outgassing. The ingot was cast in green sand
in 40 vol% nitric acid and 60 vol % water to display the macroseg-
mould to simulate the solidification time of the heavy ingot cast
regation distribution in the ingot. The etchant was washed off by
in iron mould. To reduce any influence of casting defects, such
hot water followed by alcohol. Chemical analysis on 11 drillings
as gas bubbles and inclusions the gating system was based on a
was made to qualify the macrosegregation. Four metallographic
naturally pressurised design, ensuring smooth filling without air
specimens were cut along both ingot midsections to study the
entrainment, using a bottom gating technique with a filling time
characteristics of the segregation. The positions of the samples are
of 30 s. The ingate velocity was, of course, well over the critical
illustrated in Fig. 3. The microstructure observation was carried
0.5 m s−1 due to the high sprue, so the melt was arranged to enter
out by optical microscopy. The quantitative metallographic analysis
the mould cavity at a tangent to reduce splashing (Campbell, 2003),
was made by SISC-IAS image analysis software. In addition, samples
as illustrated in Fig. 1(a). After teeming, the top was covered with
were cut along the longitudinal direction and the transverse direc-
an exothermic topping compound. The pouring temperature was
tion corresponding to the regions including the unmelted solids
1560 ◦ C.
and then the tensile tests were done. The dimensions of tensile test
The steel balls were added in the form of 20 mm diameter steel
specimen are presented in Fig. 2.
balls, the ratio of their total mass to the mass of the melt was 1%
(about 5 kg). The steel balls were made by cold heading to reduce
the introduction of any casting defects, such as gas porosity, shrink- 3. Numerical simulation procedure
age porosity and inclusions. Immediately prior to their addition to
the melt the steel balls were preheated to 60 ◦ C. In order to avoid The solidification processes in the reference ingot and the
unnecessary material modification, their composition was similar ingot with solid addition (the composite ingot) were simulated
to that of the ingot, as shown in Table 2. During the pouring process, using commercial FE casting simulation software ProCAST® . Before

Fig. 2. Dimension of the tensile test specimen.

 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711 705

Table 3
Thermophysical properties of ingot body and other parameters used in simulation.

Property Value

Liquidus temperature of ingot body 1494.0 ◦ C

Solidus temperature of ingot body 1421.0 ◦ C
Temperature of mold and steel ball 60.0 ◦ C
Pouring temperature 1560.0 ◦ C
Latent heat 299,000 J/kg
Dynamic viscosity 0.0042 Pa·s

calculation, some assumptions are made: (1) mold filling is not equations govern the natural convection of the liquid metal. The
included; (2) solid additions are uniformly distributed in the molten classical isotropic Fourier conduction law governs the heat transfer.
melt; (3) no movement of added solids are considered; and (4) Hence
convection was driven by thermal buoyancy.
In the present study, the simulation model adopts the governing Continuity
conservation for mass, momentum and energy during the solid-
ification process in ingots. The continuity and the Navier–Stokes ∇ · (V៝ ) = 0 (1)

Fig. 3. Comparison of sulfur prints: (a) reference steel ingot and (b) the composite ingot.
706 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711

Navier–Stokes
∂˚ −
→
+ ∇ · ( V ˚) = ∇ · (∇ ˚) − ∇ P + g (2)
∂t
Heat transfer

dT
c = ∇ · (k∇ T ) + Q̇ (3)
dt
where  is the density; t is time;  is the dynamic viscosity; P is
the pressure; g is the gravitational acceleration component; V៝ is the
velocity vector and ˚ is a velocity component; T is the temperature;
k is the thermal conductivity; c is the specific heat; Q̇ is an internal
power source, the value of Q̇ is 0 for the mould and 1 for the ingot.
The parameters , , k and c can vary with space (x, y, z), time (t)
and temperature (T).
The conservation equations are solved numerically using a fully
implicit time-stepping scheme and a standard finite-element for-
mulation. The pressure correction equation is obtained from the
sum of the normalized mass continuity equations using a so-called Fig. 4. Segregation ratio in carbon along the centerline of the two ingots: without
SIMPLE algorithm. Details of the numerical implementation are and with the addition of steel balls.
given in the Help File of ProCAST® (2008).
The heat transfer coefficients between different materials were 4. Results and discussion
taken from the work of Gu and Beckermann (1999) to best describe
the solidification process. The added steel balls are assumed to 4.1. Comparison between the reference ingot and the composite
have a good wettability with the melt, meaning no heat resistance ingot
exists between the solids and their surrounding liquid. All of ther-
mal and fluid properties are temperature dependent. The mesh of The sulfur prints of the two ingots are shown in Fig. 3. The dark
the casting and mould is composed of 3D four nodes or tetrahedral region and the white region correspond to the positive segregation
elements. and negative segregation zones, respectively.
The assumed thermophysical properties (calculated by ther- In Fig. 3(a), the channel segregation, also called A-type segrega-
modynamic module of ProCAST® ) of ingot body and processing tion, is distinguished as two black bands which are near the edge of
parameters are summarized in Table 3. It is assumed that the solid the ingot, inkling inwards towards the top. Moreover, the positive
additions have the same density, latent heat and thermal conduc- segregations in the central and top regions are significantly higher.
tivity as the poured alloy. Fig. 3(b) shows a reduced degree of segregation; the A-type segre-

Fig. 5. Micrographs of (a) location 11 and (b) location 21.

Fig. 6. Micrographs of (a) location 12 and (b) location 22.

 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711 707

Fig. 7. Micrographs of the location 14: (a) left, (b) near the left, (c) near the right, and (d) right.

Fig. 8. Micrographs of the location 24: (a) left, (b) near the left, (c) near the right, and (d) right.
708 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711
gations have vanished almost completely, and the top and central
positive segregations are less pronounced.
The drillings were analyzed for carbon using a LECO CS analyzer
for which the measurement accuracy is ±0.5%. The distribution
of carbon content along the centerline of the two ingots is illus-
trated in Fig. 4. It further confirms that the macrosegregation is
significantly reduced in the composite ingot.
Fig. 5 shows the microstructures at location 11 (in the reference
ingot) and location 21 (in the composite ingot). In location 11, the
microstructure consists of 80% ferrite crystal. From the equilibrium
phase diagram, the equilibrium volume fraction of ferrite crystal
in Fe–0.45 wt%C alloy is about 43% indicating substantial negative
segregation in this location. In location 21, the fraction of ferrite
crystal is about 35% indicating the carbon content to be higher
than 0.45 wt% corresponding to positive segregation at this posi-
tion. The amount of the primary phase decreases, meaning that the
carbon content is higher than 0.45 wt%. Moreover, the prior austen-
ite average grain size in location 11 is about 10 mm, whereas that
in location 21 is only about 1 mm.
Fig. 6 shows the microstructures at locations 12 and 22. In
Fig. 6(a), it can be seen that location 12 contains only about 15% fer-
rite crystal, implying positive segregation. In contrast, the volume
Fig. 9. Flow field at different times in (a) the reference ingot and (b) the composite ingot.
fraction of ferrite crystal in location 22 is about 45%, indicating the
occurrence of a lower concentration at the time when solidification
begins. Comparisons between the two locations suggest that the
central positive segregation in the (conventional) reference ingot
is more serious than that in the composite ingot. In addition, the
reference ingot has larger prior austenite grain size compared with
the composite ingot.
Figs. 7 and 8 show the microstructures at the ingot edges,
locations 14 and 24, respectively. From Fig. 7(a), it can be seen
that the ingot edge consists of fine equiaxed grains and a large
fraction of ferrite crystal. However, as noted from Fig. 7(b), with
a short distance away from the edge, the grain size increases
to about 4 mm and the amount of fraction of ferrite crystal
reduces. Yet further from the edge to, the amount of ferrite crys-
tal increases, as shown in Fig. 7(c) and (d). This sharp change of
microstructure over such a short distance indicates a highly local-
ized positive segregation band between two negative segregation
zones; it is an A-type segregation formed near the edge of the
ingot.
Fig. 8(a) shows the fine equiaxed grains, consisting mainly of
ferrite crystal, at the ingot edge. In Fig. 8(b), relatively little ferrite
crystal is found and indicating a reduced extent of segregation. The
 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711
similar microstructures in Fig. 8(b)–(d) confirm that the extent of
macrosegregation is similar, revealing no channel segregation.
4.2. Numerical simulation
Traditionally, it has been difficult to predict the features of
macrosegregation because they are determined through complex
solidification mechanisms, which are controlled by the interplay of
solute, thermal and natural or forced convection. However, numer-
ical simulation has made it possible to analyze these inter-related
phenomena in a high level of detail.
The critical parameters used to estimate the tendency towards
macrosegregation are those widely recognized as important in
many solidification regimes. They are (i) thermal gradient G and (ii)
solidification growth rate R. These parameters in turn are strongly
affected by the convection in the ingot. If the thermal gradient is
large, the channel segregation will not appear due to the formation
of a tight, columnar crystal zone structure that has a low perme-
ability. If the growth rate is large, the isotherms that move at a
faster speed will prevent the long-range transfer of the enriched
liquid from the interdendritic zone to the central region because
less time is available for solutes to accumulate.
In this paper, only the heat transfer and the fluid flow in the
ingot are taken into account. Although the present simulation in
the absence of a species-transfer model does not directly pre-
dict macrosegregation formation, the depiction of temperature and
flow fields is still helpful.
Fig. 9 shows the flow fields in the solidifying ingots. Comparing
the two ingots, the flow in the composite ingot is weaker and conse-
quently less turbulent than that in the reference ingot throughout
Fig. 10. Temperature field at different times in (a) the reference ingot and (b) the composite ingot.
709
the whole solidification process. In Fig. 10, the assumed uniform
distribution of steel balls divides the ingot into many small cooling
regions. The melt is greatly chilled because of the high thermal dif-
fusivity, giving a high cooling rate and high temperature gradient
(Fig. 11). Although, of course, the higher the temperature gradient,
the stronger the fluid flow, the smaller scale of the flow in the com-
posite ingot leads to many small localized flow cells in the melt,
in comparison with the two large flow cells in the reference ingot.
The macroscopic flows clearly lead to macroscopic segregation. In
addition, the contribution of strong localized flows to an efficient
heat transfer is a further benefit.
A faster cooling rate also reduces the secondary dendrite arm
spacing (SDAS) in the ingot, as illustrated in Fig. 12. The refined
microstructure will suppress to some extent the washing-out of
the solute-rich interdendritic liquid.
All these factors, such as larger solidification rate, high temper-
ature gradient, and refined microstructure, are contributory factors
towards the reduction of the final degree of macrosegregation.
4.3. Mechanical properties
It is noticeable that there are some unmelted steel balls at the
bottom of the ingot (the light-etching markings). Since there is no
discontinuity at the interface between the additions and the matrix,
no harmful influence on the mechanical properties appears to be
caused. In order to confirm this point, the mechanical property
analysis was made.
Results are shown in Table 4. The mechanical properties are
improved compared with the reference ingot. In the longitudinal
direction, the yield and tensile strengths are improved by 15% and
710 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711

Fig. 11. Temperature gradient at 100 s in (a) the reference ingot and (b) the composite ingot.

Fig. 12. Secondary dendrite arm spacing at 17,800 s in (a) the reference ingot and (b) the composite ingot.

10%, respectively. In the transverse direction, the yield and tensile

strengths are increased by 7% and 10%, respectively.

5. Conclusions
Table 4
Comparison of mechanical properties between the two ingots.
A new technique is proposed for the reduction of macrosegre-
Specimen Rp0.2 (MPa) Rm (MPa) gation in heavy steel ingots. Solid steel balls with a composition
No balls addition (longitudinal direction) 295 ± 5 495 ± 10 matches that of the melt are added to the ingot during the
Balls addition (longitudinal direction) 340 ± 5 546 ± 10 pouring process. In comparison with a conventional ingot, the
No balls addition (transverse direction) 323 ± 5 506 ± 10
microstructure, the extent of macrosegregation, and the mechan-
Balls addition (transverse direction) 345 ± 5 560 ± 10
ical properties are improved. Numerical simulation indicates the
 B. Sang et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 210 (2010) 703–711
reason why macrosegregation is effectively reduced is explained
by the more rapid cooling and solidification, thereby refining
microstructure.
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge the assistance provided by Professor
John Campbell throughout the experimental process. The assis-
tance provided by Dr Lugui Chen and Dr Dongrong Liu during the
numerical simulation is also appreciated.
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