Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Lauric Acid Melting at Suboptimal Inclines

Accurate modeling of melting and solidification processes is important to many engineering applications. The research presented in this article is part of an ongoing effort to document the melting behavior of lauric acid in a 50 mm by 120 mm rectangular container with an isothermal side—an experiment commonly used to validate numerical models. This article presents new experimental data of melting occurring at 135 deg and 180 deg inclines for isothermal wall temperatures of 60∘C and 70∘C. The data were processed to show the melt interface development and the melt fraction as a function of time. Furthermore, numerical simulations using the enthalpy-porosity method of the 135 deg incline were also conducted. In the numerical simulations, the mushy zone constant was parametrically varied. Different density approaches commonly found in the literature (e.g., density as a function of temperature or Boussinesq approximation) were utilized and examined. It was found that the choice of density method had a significant effect on the results. Implications of potential modeling choices unique to the enthalpy-porosity method are discussed related to the validation of models.