Modelling of Mixing in Single Screw Extruders

摘要

Polymer extrusion is one of the most important polymer processing techniques. Modelling of the phenomena developing inside single screw extruders enabled the development of commercial software which can be used to study the performance of existing systems and to define the equipment characteristics for new applications. Although mixing is one of the most important performance measures of extrusion, it is usually disregarded in the available programs. Consequently, in this work mathematical models for quantifying mixing in single screw extruders are developed and subsequently inserted in a global computer modelling program of single screw extrusion. The mixing model quantifies distributive and dispersive mixing and coalescence mechanisms in a liquid-liquid system. This is accomplished by calculating the variation of the thickness of drops considered to be suspended in the polymeric matrix, taking into account the rate and drop break-up time and the coalescence probability. The influence of several parameters, such as viscosities, initial drop dimension, screw speed and barrel temperature, are examined.