Directional solidification

Directional solidification is a series of measures applied to control the feeding of castings. As most metals and alloys solidify, changing from the liquid state to the solid state they will undergo an appreciable volume contraction. Without attention to control principles, objects cast will contain internal voids commonly called "shrink defects".

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Some of the measures applied are the use of chills, risers, control of pouring rate, pouring temperature, and the use of exothermic materials.

With proper use of the measures, as the metal solidifies the interface for the boundary between the liquid and solid metal moves towards a source of additional feed metal and away from the region where solidification began.