Pressurization of a Solidifying Sphere

Abstract

The pressurization in a solidifying sphere of molten material (initially at a uniform melting temperature) immersed in an infinite cooling medium is presented. The steady-state approximate solution applied to the heat-conduction problem with change of phase (the Stefan problem) provides the temperature distribution in the shell and rate of solidification, which can be employed in the evaluation of the pressurization stress and thermal stress distributions in the solid shell. Stress distributions are evaluated and plotted in dimensionless form. Additional results are presented for the specific case of aluminum alloy.