International Journal of Applied Ceramic Technology. (in press) 2008
Y. Chen, L. J. Struble, and G. H. Paulino
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Newmark Laboraory, 205 North Mathews Avenue, IL 61801, U.S.A.
Abstract
Co-extrusion involves simultaneous extrusion of multiple layers and can be used to produce functionally graded materials whose layers have different properties. Rheological control is vital for successful co-extrusion. During extrusion, flow in the barrel and die land in a ram extruder should be plug-like, while the paste should be sheared and uniformly elongated in the die entry region. In the barrel of the extruder, the paste flow velocity field was inferred by direct observation of the paste left in the barrel, and evidence for plug flow in the barrel was seen only at low-extrudate velocities. In the die land, the Benbow nonlinear model was employed to assess the paste flow behavior, and plug flow was achieved only when the shear stress applied to the paste by the die land wall was smaller than its yield stress. For co-extrusion, a simple method using thin-walled tubes was found to be effective to prepare layered feedrods. Functionally graded cellular structures of cement-based materials were successfully co-extruded by using a low-extrudate velocity when the paste had decreasing shear viscosity from inner to outer layers.