Abstract
The cooling slope process is a simple method to produce feedstock materials for semisolid processing. In this work, the influence of surface coating of the cooling slope on grain morphology was examined. The investigation showed that the coating on the surface of the slope can affect the forming of both the solidification shell and the morphology of α-Al phase. A zebra form coating was proposed and tested, which cannot only reduce the solidification shell but also improve the grain microstructure.
The authors would like to thank National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 50601003, no. 50971032 and no. 50874022), New Century Excellent Talents in University (NCET-07-0137) and Scientific Research Fund of Liaoning Provincial Education Department.