An experiment to measure the pressure dependence of the zero-shear-rate viscosity

A simple experimental method, based on Stokes' law for falling spheres, has been devised and used to measure the pressure-dependence of the zero-shear-rate viscosity of a polypropylene melt. The experiment was performed by maintaining three thick-walled test cylinders containing the polymer melt and the falling sphere at the same elevated temperature but different pressures for periods of time ranging from 20 to 48 hours.When compared with experiments using high-pressure capillary or rotational viscometers, this experimental method has the advantages that viscous heating is non-existent and the apparatus and data analysis are relatively simple. The principal disadvantage encountered here, thermal degradation at high temperatures, could probably be reduced by molding specimens under vacuum and by shortening the exposure time. Since the falling-sphere experiment provides data at very low shear rates and the capillary and rotational viscometers generate data at high shear rates, the two experimental methods are complementary.The pressure coefficient b [=d(In η₀/dp] was determined for Hercules Pro-fax 6523 polypropylene in two series of experiments at different temperatures. For seven experiments at 218.3°C and pressures up to 97.9 $\text{MN}\text{m}{}^2$ (14,200 psi), the average value of b ± 95% confidence limits was found to be 14.8 ($\text{GN}\text{m}{}^2$)^?1 ± 2.9.The average b was 12.6 ($\text{GN}\text{m}{}^2$)^?1 ± 1.4 in a series of eight experiments at 232.2°C and pressures up to 123 $\text{MN}\text{m}{}^2$ (17,800 psi).