Finite element analysis of planar 4:1 contraction flow with the tensor-logarithmic formulation of differential constitutive equations

High Deborah or Weissenberg number problems in viscoelastic flow modeling have been known formidably difficult even in the inertialess limit. There exists almost no result that shows satisfactory accuracy and proper mesh convergence at the same time. However recently, quite a breakthrough seems to have been made in this field of computational rheology. So called matrix-logarithm (here we name it tensor-logarithm) formulation of the viscoelastic constitutive equations originally written in terms of the conformation tensor has been suggested by Fattal and Kupferman (2004) and its finite element implementation has been first presented by Hulsen (2004). Both the works have reported almost unbounded convergence limit in solving two benchmark problems. This new formulation incorporates proper polynomial interpolations of the logarithm for the variables that exhibit steep exponential dependence near stagnation points, and it also strictly preserves the positive definiteness of the conformation tensor. In this study, we present an alternative procedure for deriving the tensor-logarithmic representation of the differential constitutive equations and provide a numerical example with the Leonov model in 4:1 planar contraction flows. Dramatic improvement of the computational algorithm with stable convergence has been demonstrated and it seems that there exists appropriate mesh convergence even though this conclusion requires further study. It is thought that this new formalism will work only for a few differential constitutive equations proven globally stable. Thus the mathematical stability criteria perhaps play an important role on the choice and development of the suitable constitutive equations. In this respect, the Leonov viscoelastic model is quite feasible and becomes more essential since it has been proven globally stable and it offers the simplest form in the tensor-logarithmic formulation.