Patent ID: 8312916

Claim:
A method for casting a composite metal ingot comprising at least two separately formed layers of one or more alloys, the method comprises (a) providing a solid substrate of a first alloy and a molten melt of a second alloy, the solid substrate being positioned such that an upper surface of the substrate is formed by a long side of the solid substrate; (b) providing a casting mould, the substrate and the casting mould being movable relative to one another, and wherein the casting mould comprises a liquid feed end for supplying the casting mould with a molten second alloy and an exit end with at least one outlet for casting the molten second alloy downwardly onto the substrate, and (c) while continuously moving the casting mould and the substrate relative to one another in a substantially horizontal direction, casting the molten second alloy downwardly through the at least one outlet of the casting mould onto the upper surface of the substrate at a temperature wherein the substrate locally at least partly remelts beginning at a reference point of a remelting zone and mixes at least partly with the molten second alloy to form an alloy pool, and after the remelting the molten alloy pool continuously cools and solidifies at a location away from the reference point and joins the substrate to form the composite ingot before discharging from the casting mould.