*7.3. Casting of AA6111 without the Use of Side Dams*

The friction imposed by a slowly-moving belt reduces the velocity of the molten metal over the moving belt. As a result, the molten metal tends to spread outwards, as shown in Figure 5c,d. However, adjacent to the free interface, the flow of the molten metal is directed towards the center, as is evident from the z-component of iso-velocities presented above. Depending on the relative magnitude of these two opposing effects, the molten metal can either flow towards the center, or outwards.

However, by looking at Figure 7, it can be clearly seen that the molten metal is flowing towards the center. This is very beneficial, as it eliminates the need for side dams to control the outward flow of the molten metal. The successful casting of the AA6111 strip (Figure 7b), without the aid of side dams (See Figure 7), experimentally, verifies the numerical modeling predictions.

#### *7.4. Pressure Distribution of Molten Metal and the Generation of a Vortex Near the Triple Point*

It is observed via the numerical simulations, that the inclined refractory plane has the tendency to lessen, or moderate, the final impact of the molten metal on to the moving belt, by converting a part of the molten metal's kinetic energy into static pressure, as presented in Figure 9b.

**Figure 9.** (**a**) Dynamic Pressure, Pdyn = 0.5ρ u2 <sup>i</sup> , where ρ is the density, u is the velocity. (**b**) Absolute pressure (103,281 Pa).

Additionally, the numerical simulations predict a considerably higher absolute pressure (low velocity) near the quadruple region (Figure 9b), due to sudden decrease in velocity of the molten metal

by a slow-moving belt. This results in a part of the impinging molten metal climbing upwards, forming a vortex, as shown in Figure 10. Furthermore, the dynamic pressure, i.e., <sup>1</sup> <sup>2</sup>ρu2 is observed to be highly adjacent to the molten melt/air interface. This result is due to the high velocity of the molten metal near the free surface, as shown in Figure 9a.

**Figure 10.** The swirling motion of the molten metal at the triple point, after the second impingement.
