Experimental Investigation of the Development of Interfacial Instabilities in Two Layer Coextrusion Dies

Abstract The stability of two-layer flow of polyethylene and polystyrene is experimentally studied in different flow geometries and for various flow rate ratios. A first coextrusion device allows to stop the coextrusion flow in a very long slit channel, to cool down the polymer sample and to dismantle the die in order to extract extrudate which is then carefully analyzed. A second device allows to observe the whole slit flow through transparent lateral walls and to record the interfacial waves in both spontaneous and controlled unstable conditions. Both devices point clearly out that the interfacial defect begins to grow after a specific flow distance and is then quickly amplified. This demonstrates the convective character of interfacial wave. Controlled unstable processing conditions in transparent die allow to measure accurately growth rate of defect in the linear regime and show quick occurrence of non linear regime.