Extrusion scale-up : an optimization-based methodology

Abstract

Given a reference extruder with a certain geometry and operating point, the aim of scale-up is to define the geometry and operating conditions of a target extruder (generally of significantly different size) in order to subject the material being processed to the same flow and heat transfer conditions, thus yielding products with the same characteristics. Since existing scale-up rules are crude, as they usually consider a single performance measure and produce unsatisfactory results, this work approaches scale-up as a multi-criteria optimization problem, where the aim is to define the geometry/operating conditions of the target extruder that minimize the differences between the values of various performance criteria for the reference and target extruders. Some case studies are discussed involving individual and multi-criteria scaling-up in terms of operating conditions, geometry, and both together, the usefulness of the approach being demonstrated. A few experiments are also performed in order to validate the concept.