Author(s)

Graham de Vahl Davis

Abstract

This paper presents a review of recent modelling work by the author and his group devoted to a study of the solidification and melting of a weak binary alloy in a Bridgman furnace. The work has been undertaken in connection with the MEPHISTO-4 program, which is a study of the solidification and melting of an alloy of bismuth with 1 at% tin in a microgravity environment. The enthalpy method is used. The effects of thermal and solutai convection and (in some of the results presented) of the dependence of melting temperature on solute concentration are included. Two approaches are being employed. In the first, the primitive variable equations are solved by a finite volume discretization, using a commercial flow code CFX 4.1. In the second, a finite difference/finite volume discretization of the vorticity-stream function formulation of the equations is solved by an i

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