A liquid aluminum alloy electromagnetic transport process for high pressure die casting

For the electromagnetic transport (EMT) of liquid aluminum alloy during high pressure die casting (HPDC) by the plane induction electromagnetic pump (EMP), how to improve EMT efficiency and control EMT stationarity are key problems. Magnetic-flow coupling analysis was used to reveal effects of structural design and transport process parameters on EMT efficiency and stationarity. The output pump height of plane induction EMP was optimized by matching of iron core width W, coil width W′ and pump ditch width b, i.e., b values of bopt corresponding to 90% of the maximum output pump height, bopt/W = 1.27 and bopt/W′ = 1. Both EMT efficiency and stationarity are achieved under the optimum transport current 32 A. With the increase of the transport height from 350 mm to 500 mm, the EMT flow rate decreases from 4.28 kg/s to 3.59 kg/s, and the fillings of shot sleeve are always stationary. The transport tubes suffer a maximum positive pressure of 1.8 × 104 Pa and a minimum negative pressure of −1.42 × 104 Pa during EMT. For the liquid aluminum alloy soup occasions of 4.5 kg, 6.5 kg and 12.0 kg, the transport time could be shortened significantly from manipulator’s 16 s, 22 s and 38 s to EMT’s at most 2.195 s, 2.75 s and 4.28 s, respectively. The developed EMT process with plane induction EMP for HPDC is a process with low cost, high transport efficiency and stationarity.