Planar contraction flow of a nematic PPTA solution

Abstract

Planar contraction flow of a nematic solution of poly-paraphenylene terephthalamide (PPTA) in sulphuric acid (H2SO4) was studied experimentally and compared with the flow of an isotropic model fluid, a poly-ethyleneglycol–poly-ethyleneoxide (PEG-PEO) Boger fluid, in the same geometry. The dimensions and deformation rates in our experiments are relevant for industrial polymer extrusion processes, such as fiber spinning. Under these conditions, viscoelastic lip vortices arise at the re-entrant corners in the nematic flow. The experimental results show that the vortex growth behavior in the nematic PPTA solution closely resembles that in isotropic viscoelastic fluids, such as the PEG-PEO Boger fluid that was used as a reference. The velocity field in the nematic flow is characteristic of Hele-Shaw flow of a shear-thinning power-law fluid, although locally, the influence of the nematic defect structure was observed, especially for the first minutes after starting the flow. Furthermore, the lateral movement of the extruded jet, downstream of the contraction, was shown to be coupled with velocity fluctuations in the upstream flow. Our experiments give detailed insight in the complex flow behavior of a nematic polymer solution under flow conditions that are relevant to practical applications. The results can be applied in the optimization of nematic polymer extrusion processes.