The influence of mould metallurgy an surface defects in peritectic carbon and austenitic stainless steels

This paper describes the work done on a collaborative ECSC project between British Steel, CSM and Irsid to investigate the causes of surface defects i n peritectic carbon and austenitic stainless steels. Grooved mould plates of different designs have been used during plant trial s to modify the heat transfer in the continuous casting mould and results a re correlated with slab and plate defect data. Modelwork to study the therm omechanical behaviour of the solidifying shell near the meniscus is also de scribed. Neural networks have been used off-line with data from the experim ental investigations of the partners, to assess the casting conditions and predict the occurrence of defects.