Aggregation of concentrated polymer latex in stirred vessels

Vaccaro, Andrea and Sefcik, Jan and Wu, Hua and Morbidelli, Massimo and Bobet, Josselin and Fringant, Christophe (2006) Aggregation of concentrated polymer latex in stirred vessels. AIChE Journal, 52 (8). pp. 2742-2756. ISSN 0001-1541 (https://doi.org/10.1002/aic.10843)

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Abstract

An assessment of the relative magnitude of the timescales of mixing and aggregation of fully destabilized polymeric latices in stirred vessels is presented. It is demonstrated that, in industrially relevant conditions (that is, volume fractions above 10% and primary aggregate sizes below 200 nm), latices aggregate and possibly gel before complete mixing is achieved. By means of focused beam reflectance measurements, we measure on-line and in situ the size of aggregates obtained aggregating a PVDC latex at salt concentrations above the critical coagulation concentration in a stirred vessel operated in semibatch. Several experimental runs are conducted and averages of the aggregate size distribution, that is, volume and number averages, are measured at various values of the feed flowrate, feed solid volume fraction, stirring speed and final volume fraction in the vessel. It is,found that at high feeding volume fractions aggregates instantaneously aggregate and gel on entering the vessel. Resulting aggregates are then broken down to volume weighted average sizes falling in the range between 100 and 400 microns at steady state. The experimental results are interpreted in terms of a competition between the aggregation/gelation process and mixing. In particular, by evaluating the relevant characteristic times, it is found that the process is dominated by the competition between mesomixing at the location, where the latex enters the vessel and the aggregation/gelation process. Scanning electron micrographs of dry samples obtained after thermal treatment show aggregate morphologies which further support the above interpretation.

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