The effect of transient viscoelastic properties on interfacial instabilities in superposed pressure driven channel flows

In a recent study, Ganpule and Khomami (submitted to J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech.) have shown that in order to accurately describe the experimentally observed interfacial instability phenomenon in superposed channel flow of viscoelastic fluids, a constitutive equation that can accurately depict not only the steady viscometric properties of the experimental test fluids, but also their transient viscoelastic properties must be used in the analysis. In the present study, the effect of differences in transient viscoelastic properties which can arise either due to the differences in the predictive capabilities of various constitutive models or from the presence of multiple modes of relaxation on the interfacial instabilities of the superposed pressure driven channel flows has been investigated. Specifically, a linear stability analysis is performed using nonlinear constitutive equations which predict identical steady viscometric properties but different transient viscoelastic properties. It is shown that different nonlinear constitutive equations give rise to the same mechanism of interfacial instability, but the boundaries of the neutral stability contours and the magnitudes of the growth/decay rates, especially at intermediate and shortwaves, are shifted due to the overshoots in the transient viscoelastic responses predicted by the constitutive equations. In addition, the effect of the presence of multiple modes of relaxation on interfacial stability is studied using single and multiple mode upper convected Maxwell (UCM) fluids and it is shown that pronounced differences in the intermediate and shortwave linear stability predictions arise due to the fact that the increase in the number of modes gives rise to additional fast as well as slow relaxation modes and the presence of these additional relaxation modes gives rise to differences in the transient viscoelastic response of the fluids in the absence of any overshoots. The effect of fluid inertia on the interfacial stability of viscoelastic liquids is examined and it is shown that at longwaves, inertia has a pronounced effect on the stability of the interface, whereas at shortwaves, elastic and viscous effects dominate. Furthermore, the mechanism of viscoelastic interfacial instabilities is studied by a careful examination of disturbance eigenfunctions as well as performing a disturbance energy analysis. The results indicate that the mechanism of viscoelastic interfacial instabilities can be described in terms of interaction of mechanisms of purely viscous and purely elastic instabilities. However, since more than one mechanism for the instability is at work, the disturbance energy analysis can not clearly distinguish between them due to the fact that the eigenfunctions used in the energy analysis contain the information regarding both viscous and elastic effects. Hence, the mechanism of the instability must be determined by a careful examination of disturbance eigenfunctions.     

Suppression or enhancement of interfacial instability in two-layer plane Couette flow of FENE-P fluids past a deformable solid layer

The linear stability of two-layer plane Couette flow of FENE-P fluids past a deformable solid layer is analyzed in order to examine the effect of solid deformability on the interfacial instability due to elasticity and viscosity stratification at the two-fluid interface. The solid layer is modeled using both linear viscoelastic and neo-Hookean constitutive equations. The limiting case of two-layer flow of upper-convected Maxwell (UCM) fluids is used as a starting point, and results for the FENE-P case are obtained by numerically continuing the UCM results for the interfacial mode to finite values of the chain extensibility parameter. For the case of two-layer plane Couette flow past a rigid solid surface, our results show that the finite extensibility of the polymer chain significantly alters the neutral stability boundaries of the interfacial instability. In particular, the two-layer Couette flow of FENE-P fluids is found to be unstable in a larger range of nondimensional parameters when compared to two-layer flow of UCM fluids. The presence of the deformable solid layer is shown to completely suppress the interfacial instability in most of the parameter regimes where the interfacial mode is unstable, while it could have a completely destabilizing effect in other parameter regimes even when the interfacial mode is stable in rigid channels. When compared with two-layer UCM flow, the two-layer FENE-P case is found in general to require solid layers with relatively lower shear modulii in order to suppress the interfacial instability. The results from the linear elastic solid model are compared with those obtained using the (more rigorous) neo-Hookean model for the solid, and good agreement is found between the two models for neutral stability curves pertaining to the two-fluid interfacial mode. The present study thus provides an important extension of the earlier analysis of two-layer UCM flow [V. Shankar, Stability of two-layer viscoelastic plane Couette flow past a deformable solid layer: implications of fluid viscosity stratification, J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech. 125 (2005) 143–158] to more accurate constitutive models for the fluid and solid layers, and reaffirms the central conclusion of instability suppression in two-layer flows of viscoelastic fluids by soft elastomeric coatings in more realistic settings.     

Forward roll coating flows of viscoelastic liquids

Roll coating is distinguished by the use of one or more gaps between rotating cylinders to meter and apply a liquid layer to a substrate. Except at low speed, the two-dimensional film splitting flow that occurs in forward roll coating is unstable; a three-dimensional steady flow sets in, resulting in more or less regular stripes in the machine direction. For Newtonian liquids, the stability of the two-dimensional flow is determined by the competition of capillary and viscous forces: the onset of meniscus nonuniformity is marked by a critical value of the capillary number. Although most of the liquids coated industrially are non-Newtonian polymeric solutions and dispersions, most of the theoretical analyses of film splitting flows relied on the Newtonian model. Non-Newtonian behavior can drastically change the nature of the flow near the free surface; when minute amounts of flexible polymer are present, the onset of the three-dimensional instability occurs at much lower speeds than in the Newtonian case.Forward roll coating flow is analyzed here with two differential constitutive models, the Oldroyd-B and the FENE-P equations. The results show that the elastic stresses change the flow near the film splitting meniscus by reducing and eventually eliminating the recirculation present at low capillary number. When the recirculation disappears, the difference of the tangential and normal stresses (i.e., the hoop stress) at the free surface becomes positive and grows dramatically with fluid elasticity, which explains how viscoelasticity destabilizes the flow in terms of the analysis of Graham [M.D. Graham, Interfacial hoop stress and instability of viscoelastic free surface flows, Phys. Fluids 15 (2003) 1702–1710].     

An incompressible SPH method for simulation of unsteady viscoelastic free-surface flows

In this paper, an incompressible smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) method is presented to solve unsteady free-surface flows. Both Newtonian and viscoelastic fluids are considered. In the case of viscoelastic fluids, both the Maxwell and Oldroyd-B models are investigated. The proposed SPH method uses a Poisson pressure equation to satisfy the incompressibility constraints. The solution algorithm is an explicit predictor-corrector scheme and employs an adaptive smoothing length based on density variations. To alleviate the numerical difficulties encountered when fluid is highly stretched, an artificial stress term is incorporated into the momentum equation which reduces the risk of unrealistic fractures in the material. Two challenging test cases, the impacting drop and the jet buckling problems, are solved to demonstrate the capability of the proposed scheme in handling viscoelastic flows with complex free surfaces. The jet buckling test case was solved for a wide range of Weissenberg numbers. It was shown that in all cases the method is stable and fairly accurate and agrees well with the available data.     

Onset of electroconvective instability of Oldroydian viscoelastic liquid layer in Brinkman porous medium

The problem of the onset of electrohydrodynamic instability in a horizontal layer of Oldroydian viscoelastic dielectric liquid through Brinkman porous medium under the simultaneous action of a certical ac electric field and a vertical temperature gradient is analyzed. Applying linear stability theory, we derive an equation of eight order. Under somewhat suitable boundary conditions, this equation can be solved exactly to yield the required eigenvalue relationship from which various critical values are determined in detail. Both the cases of stationary and oscillatory instabilities are discussed if the liquid layer is heated from below or above. The effects of the porosity of porous medium, the medium permeability, the Prandtl number, the ratio of retardation time to relaxation time, the elastic number, in the presence or absence of Rayleigh number are shown graphically for both cases. Some of the known results are derived as special cases. The electrical force has been shown to be the sole agency causing instability of the considered system since it is much more important than the buoyancy force even if the medium is porous.     

Multiscale simulation of viscoelastic free surface flows

A micro–macro approach based on combining the Brownian configuration fields (BCF) method [M.A. Hulsen, A.P.G. van Heel, B.H.A.A. van den Brule, Simulation of viscoelastic flow using Brownian configuration fields, J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech. 70 (1997) 79–101] with an Arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian (ALE) Galerkin finite element method, using elliptic mesh generation equations coupled with time-dependent conservation equations, is applied to study slot coating flows of polymer solutions. The polymer molecules are represented by dumbbells with both linear and non-linear springs; hydrodynamic interactions between beads are incorporated. Calculations with infinitely extensible (Hookean) and pre-averaged finitely extensible (FENE-P) dumbbell models are performed and compared with equivalent closed-form macroscopic models in a conformation tensor based formulation [M. Pasquali, L.E. Scriven, Free surface flows of polymer solutions with models based on the conformation tensor, J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech. 108 (2002) 363–409]. The BCF equation for linear dumbbell models is solved using a fully implicit time integration scheme which is found to be more stable than the explicit Euler scheme used previously to compute complex flows. We find excellent agreement between the results of the BCF based formulation and the macroscopic conformation tensor based formulation. The computations using the BCF approach are stable at much higher Weissenberg numbers, (where λ is the characteristic relaxation time of polymer, and is the characteristic rate of strain) compared to the purely macroscopic conformation tensor based approach, which fail beyond a maximum Wi. A novel computational algorithm is introduced to compute complex flows with non-linear microscopic constitutive models (i.e. non-linear FENE dumbbells and dumbbells with hydrodynamic interactions) for which no closed-form constitutive equations exist. This algorithm is fast and computationally efficient when compared to both an explicit scheme and a fully implicit scheme involving the solution of the non-linear equations with Newton’s method for each configuration field.     

The analysis of stability of Bingham fluid flowing down an inclined plane

ＴＨＥＡＮＡＬＹＳＩＳＯＦＳＴＡＢＩＬＩＴＹＯＦＢＩＮＧＨＡＭＦＬＵＩＤＦＬＯＷＩＮＧＤＯＷＮＡＮＩＮＣＬＩＮＥＤＰＬＡＮＥＷａｎｇＰｅｉｇｕａｎｇ（王培光）;ＷａｎｇＺｈｅｎｄｏｎｇ（王振东）（ＲｅｃｅｉｖｅｄＤｅｃ．１．１９９４;Ｃｏｍｍｕｎｉｃ...     

Detecting instabilities in flows of viscoelastic fluids

There is a growing interest in developing numerical tools to investigate the onset of physical instabilities observed in experiments involving viscoelastic flows, which is a difficult and challenging task as the simulations are very sensitive to numerical instabilities. Following a recent linear stability analysis carried out in order to better understand qualitatively the origin of numerical instabilities occurring in the simulation of flows viscoelastic fluids, the present paper considers a possible extension for more complex flows. This promising method could be applied to track instabilities in complex (i.e. essentially non‐parallel) flows. In addition, results related to transient growth mechanism indicate that it might be responsible for the development of numerical instabilities in the simulation of viscoelastic fluids. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Solitary waves on the surface of a viscoelastic fluid running down an inclined plane

In this paper, we study the existence and the role of solitary waves in the finite amplitude instability of a layer of a second-order fluid flowing down an inclined plane. The layer becomes unstable for disturbances of large wavelength for a critical value of Reynolds number which decreases with increase in the viscoelastic parameter M. The long-term evolution of a disturbance with an initial cosinusoidal profile as a result of this instability reveals the existence of a train of solitary waves propagating on the free surface. A novel result of this study is that the number of solitary waves decreases with in crease in M. When surface tension is large, we use dynamical system theory to describe solitary waves in a moving frame by homoclinic trajectories of an associated ordinary differential equation.     

Influence of the capillarity on a creeping film flow down an inclined plane with an edge

Summary In creeping flows of thin films, the capillarity can play a dominant role. In this paper, the creeping film flow down an inclined plane with an edge is considered. The influence of the capillarity on the velocity and the film surface is studied analytically, numerically and experimentally. Received 12 April 1999; accepted for publication 9 May 1999     

Wavy wall influence on the hydrodynamic instability of a liquid film flowing along an inclined plane

The film dynamic of a thin liquid along an inclined and wavy wall was numerically depicted in a weighted-residual integral boundary layer equation. A qualitative and quantitative analysis was initially carried out and accurate comparisons were obtained from experimental data on film instability along a flat and inclined as well as a wavy wall. To pinpoint the effect of waviness on film instability, 20 wavy wall periods in the computational CFD domain were considered. Several waviness parameters were studied and shown to have taken on a major role in the film instability process. Finally, a wide range of main wall inclination angles was taken into account, and consequent numerical data permitted identification of a threshold angle value. For wall angles higher than the threshold angle, the film behaved as though no corrugations were present. For lower angles, the film was repeatedly altered during the acceleration and deceleration phases.     

The thermoconvective instability of plane poiseuille flow heated from below: A proposed benchmark solution for open boundary flows

The transient two-dimensional Navier-Stokes and energy equations have been solved numerically for flow in a horizontal channel heated from below in the Boussinesq limit. For the set of dimensionless parameters chosen, the flow consists of periodic transverse travelling waves resulting from a convective instability. The solution is proposed as a benchmark for the application of outflow boundary conditions (OBC) in time-dependent flows with strong buoyancy effects. Richardson extrapolation in both time and space is used in obtaining the solution. Field plots and profiles of velocity, temperature, vorticity and streamfunction at selected axial positions and times are also presented from the finest grid and smallest time step calculation. The calculations have been made on an extended domain so that the effects of OBC used in the present study would be negligible in the test region.     

Effect of purely elastic flow instability on molecular conformation and drag

Linear stability analysis has shown that viscoelastic creeping flow of an Oldroyd-B liquid through a sinusoidal channel is unstable to stationary, wall-localized and short wavelength perturbations [B. Sadanandan, R. Sureshkumar, Global linear stability analysis of non-separated viscoelastic flow through a periodically constricted channel, J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech. 122 (2004) 55]. In this work, time-dependent simulations are performed to determine the nonlinear evolution of finite amplitude disturbances in the post-critical flow regime. It is shown that a nonlinear transition, which is facilitated by a supercritical pitchfork bifurcation, establishes a finite amplitude state (FAS) in which the average polymer stretch is highly modulated. The maximum normal stress, observed at the channel nip, can increase by up to approximately 100% when the Weissenberg number, defined as the ratio of the fluid relaxation time to an inverse characteristic shear rate, is increased by only 10% beyond its critical value. This is attributed to the amplification of configurational perturbations by the base flow shear rate, which attains its maximum at the channel nip. The effect of finite chain extensibility on the critical condition and nonlinear instability is investigated using the FENE-CR model. The stabilizing effect of finite extensibility can be expressed through a renormalization of the Weissenberg number by accounting for the screening effect of the nonlinear force law on the transmission of configurational perturbations to polymeric stress. The principal features of the FAS are qualitatively model-independent. The FAS exhibits a small, but numerically perceptible increase in the friction factor as compared to the base flow. The implication of the findings on the experimentally observed flow resistance enhancement phenomenon in viscoelastic creeping flows through converging/diverging geometries is discussed.     

Effect of surface tension and viscosity on bubble growth of single mode Rayleigh-Taylor instability

Based on the Zufiria theoretical model, a new model regarding the asymptotic bubble velocity for the Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability is presented by use of the complex velocity potential proposed by Sohn. The proposed model is an extension of the ordinary Zufiria model and can deal with non-ideal fluids. With the control variable method, the effect of the viscosity and surface tension on the bubble growth rate of the RT instability is studied. The result is consistent with Cao’s result if we only consider the viscous effect and with Xia’s result if we only consider the surface tension effect. The asymptotic bubble velocity predicted by the Zufiria model is smaller than that predicted by the Layzer model, and the result from the Zufiria model is much closer to White’s experimental data.     

Macroscopic and microscopic examination of the relationship between crack velocity and path and Rayleigh surface wave speed in single crystal silicon

The speed of Rayleigh surface waves, denoted C_R, is the accepted upper limit for Mode I crack velocity in monolithic solids. In the current contribution, we discuss several critical issues associated with the velocity of Rayleigh surface waves and crack velocity in single crystal (SC) brittle solids, and the global and local influence of C_R on crack path selection in particular.Recent cleavage experiments in SC silicon showed that crack velocity at certain cleavage planes and crystallographic orientations cannot exceed a small fraction of C_R, and thereafter the crack deflects to other cleavage planes. Indeed, C_R defined by the continuum mechanics ignores atomistic phenomena occurring during rapid crack propagation, and therefore is limited in predicting the crack velocity. Examination of these anomalies shows that this limitation lies in microstructural lattice arrangement and in anisotropic phonon radiation during rapid crack propagation. Globally, C_R has no influence on the crack deflection phenomenon. However, the misfit in C_R between the original plane of propagation and the deflected plane generates local instabilities along the deflection zone.