THREE-DIMENSIONAL FLOW FIELD ANALYSIS OF FLIGHT ELEMENT IN A CO-ROTATING TWIN SCREW REACTOR

Twin screw reactor is a new-style reactor with high efficiency and hardly contaminative, but many theories are immature. The flow of high viscosity material is very complex, so it is difficult to be solved by the way of analysis. Three-dimensional flow field analysis of flight element in a co-rotating twin screw reactor was analyzed by ANSYS and the rule of velocity field, pressure field, viscosity field, shearing stress and characteristic curve were given. The numerical results show that material has large pressure gradient, velocity and shearing stress at the intermeshing region and material is fully blended. Plus axial velocity in gutter manifests that most of material flow to the exit. The flow rate is proportional to the screw speed and inverse ratio to pressure gradient.