Melt rheology of nanometre‐calcium‐carbonate‐filled acrylonitrile–butadiene–styrene (ABS) copolymer composites during capillary extrusion

The melt flow properties during capillary extrusion of nanometre‐calcium‐carbonate‐filled acrylonitrile–butadiene–styrene (ABS) copolymer composites were measured by using a Rosand rheometer to identify the effects of the filler content and operation conditions on the rheological behaviour of the sample melts. The experiments were conducted under the following test conditions: temperature varied from 220 to 240 °C and shear rate ranged from 10 to 10 4  s −1 . The filler volume fractions were 0, 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50%. The results showed that the shear flow did not strictly obey the power law under the test conditions, and that the entry pressure drop (Δ P en ) and the extension stress ( σ e ) in entry flow increased nonlinearly, while the melt shear viscosity ( η s ) and extension viscosity ( η e ) decreased with increasing the wall shear stress ( τ w ) at constant test temperature. The dependence of the melt shear viscosity on the test temperature was approximately consistent with the Arrhenius expression at fixed τ w . When τ w was constant, η s and η e increased while Δ P en and σ e decreased with the addition of the filler volume fraction. © 2002 Society of Chemical Industry