Flow of viscoplastic materials through converging channels

Many classical rigid perfectly/plastic solutions cannot be extended to more complicated rigid plastic materials, such as rigid plastic hardening materials and rigid viscoplastic materials. The present paper reveals sources of this difficulty in the case of flow of rigid viscoplastic material through infinite converging rough wedge-shaped and axisymmetric channels. Two types of viscoplastic models without strain hardening are considered, with and with no saturation stress. The maximum friction law is adopted at the friction surface. Qualitative features of the solutions are compared to those occurring in compression of a rigid plastic layer between rough, parallel plates. (© 2008 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)