On the influence of solid-phase volume fraction on the adiabatic coarsening of a mushy zone

This note applies a macroscopic theory of the authors (Int. J. Non-linear Mech. 25, 319, 1990) to the 0stwald ripening of a homogeneous mushy zone of a pure material under adiabatic conditions. In particular, it is shown that by assuming that a material relaxation parameter has a simple polynomial dependence upon the solid volume fraction a satisfactory agreement can be obtained with some high precision thermal decay experiments of Glicksman et al. (Metal. Trans. A 23, 659, 1992). © 1995.