Modelling morphology evolution during solidification of IPP in processing conditions

Abstract

During polymer processing, crystallization takes place during or soon after flow. In most of cases, the flow field dramatically influences both the crystallization kinetics and the crystal morphology. On their turn, crystallinity and morphology affect product properties. Consequently, in the last decade, researchers tried to identify the main parameters determining crystallinity and morphology evolution during solidification In processing conditions. In this work, we present an approach to model flow-induced crystallization with the aim of predicting the morphology after processing. The approach is based on: interpretation of the FIC as the effect of molecular stretch on the thermodynamic crystallization temperature; modeling the molecular stretch evolution by means of a model simple and easy to be implemented in polymer processing simulation codes; identification of the effect of flow on nucleation density and spherulites growth rate by means of simple experiments; determination of the condition under which fibers form instead of spherulites. Model predictions reproduce most of the features of final morphology observed in the samples after solidification. © 2014 American Institute of Physics.