Analysis of Non-uniform Mechanical Behavior for a Continuous Casting Mold Based on Heat Flux from Inverse Problem

The distortion of mold plates plays an important role in the formation of surface cracks on continuously cast steel products. To investigate the non-uniform distortion of a mold, a full-scale stress model of the mold was developed. An inverse algorithm was applied to calculate the heat flux using the temperatures measured by the thermocouples buried inside the mold plates. Based on this, a full-scale, finite-element stress model, including four copper plates, a nickel layer and water slots in different depths, was built to determine the complex mechanical behavior of the continuous casting mold used to produce steel slabs. The heat flux calculated by the inverse algorithm was applied to the stress model to analyze the non-uniform mechanical behavior. The results showed that the stress and distortion distributions of the four copper plates were not symmetrical, which reflected the non-uniform distortion behaviors of copper plates, water slots, nickel layer and the corner region of the mold. The gap between the mold and the slab was increased because of the corner distortion, which was very important for the heat transfer of initial solidifying shell, and it may be a major reason for the slow cooling of the slab corner.