Stick-slip flow of high density polyethylene in a transparent slit die investigated by laser Doppler velocimetry

The oscillating flow instability of a molten linear high-density polyethylene is carefully studied using a single screw extruder equipped with a transparent slit die. Experiments are performed using laser Doppler velocimetry in order to obtain the local velocities field across the entire die width. At low flow rate, the extrusion is stable and steady state velocity profiles are obtained. During the instability, the velocity oscillates between two steady state limits, suggesting a periodic stick-slip transition mechanism. At high flow rate, the flow is mainly characterized by a pronounced wall slip. We show that wall slip occurs all along the die land. An investigation of the slip flow conditions shows that wall slip is not homogeneous in a cross section of the slit die, and that pure plug flow occurs only for very high flow rates. A numerical computation of the profile assuming wall slip boundary conditions is done to obtain the true local wall slip velocity. It confirms that slip velocities are of the same order of magnitude as those measured with a capillary rheometer.