An Analysis of Heat Conduction with Change of Phase with Application to the Solidification of Copper

J. Michalski[1], and E. Gutirrez-Miravete[2]
[1]Hamilton-Sundstrand
[2]Rensselaer at Hartford, Hartford, Connecticut, US
Published in 2009

The goal of this study was to determine the possibility of using the finite element in COMSOL Multiphysics program to obtain a high accuracy solution to a moving boundary problem, specifically, the solidification of copper. A one-dimensional geometry in Cartesian coordinates was used to investigate the solidification of initially liquid copper from a chilled wall maintained at fixed temperature. The other boundary was assumed adiabatic. Analytical and finite difference methods were also employed to solve the problem and to create a basis for comparison. Accurate solutions can be obtained using COMSOL Multiphysics but only after carefully tuning the solution parameters, particularly the time step.

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