Applied Mathematics, 2013, 4, 330-337

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/am.2013.42050 Published Online February 2013 (http://www.scirp.org/journal/am)

Exact Solutions of a Power Law Fluid Model in

Posttreatment Analysis of Wire Coating with Linearly
Varying Boundary Temperature
Rehan Ali Shah1*, Saeed Islam2, Abdul Majeed Siddiqui3, Tahira Haroon4

Department of Basic Sciences and Islamiat, University of Engineering and Technology, Peshawar, Pakistan
2
Department of Mathematics, Abdul Wali Khan University, Mardan, Pakistan
3
Department of Mathematics, Pennsylvania State University, York Campus, York, USA
4
Department of Mathematics, COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan
Email: *[email protected]
Received April 19, 2012; revised January 11, 2013; accepted January 18, 2013

ABSTRACT
In this paper, analysis of post-treatment of wire coating is presented. Coating material satisfies power law fluid model.
Exact solutions for the velocity field, volume flow rate and average velocity are obtained. Moreover, the heat transfer
results are presented for different cases of linearly varying on the boundaries. The variations of velocity, volume flow
rate, radius of coated wire, shear rate and the force on the total wire are presented graphically and discussed.
Keywords: Exact Solution; Wire Coating; Power Law Fluid Model; Linearly Varying Temperature at Boundaries

1. Introduction
The wire coating process is basically an extrusion operation in which either the molten polymer, in the form of
tubing, is extruded continuously over axially moving
wire, or the wire is pulled through the extruded molten
polymer. Polymer extrudate is an important industrial
process used for coating a wire for primary insulation of
conducting wires with molten polymers for mechanical
strength and environmental protection purposes. Wire
coating have many application in the field of chemical
and industrial engineering. Many authors have studied
the wire coating phenomena.
The basic concept of modeling the wire coating for
viscous fluid is given in the books by Denn and middleman [1,2]. McKelvey [3] and Paton et al. [4] have analyzed the flow of Newtonian and power law fluid model
in wire coating process, and obtained expressions for the
flow rate, shear rate and the velocity distribution along
the radial direction. Gagley and storey [5] provided numerical simulations for a Newtonian fluid in the form of
dimensionless parameters characterizing the wire speed,
die dimensions, radial position, shear rate, and melt viscosity. Akhter and Hashmi [6,7] have developed the
mathematical model for wire coating using power law
model and investigated the effect of the change in viscosity. A.M Siddiqui, T.Haroon and H. Khan [8] studied
*

Corresponding author.

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

the wire coating extrusion in a pressure-type die in flow

of third grade fluid. Fenner and Williams [9] carried out
an analysis of the flow in the tapering section of a pressure type die. They obtained the numerical solutions for
the pressure and velocity profiles in the die. M. Sajjid et
al. [10] studied the wire coating with Oldroyd 8-constant
fluid and gave the solution for velocity field in the series
form.
The coated wire after leaving the die is effected by the
quality of the material used in coating process, the wire
drawing velocity and the temperature. There are very few
disclosures presenting theoretical analysis of flow in the
posttreatment process subsequent to the die.
The analysis of the drag flow of the coated polymer
outside pressure die was carried out by Kasajima and
Katsuhiko Ito [11]. They derived the expression for velocity and temperature field. Moreover, they found the
volume flow rate, average velocity and discussed some
cases for constant velocity and constant temperature on
the boundaries. We work under the same geometry as by
Masayuki Kasajima and Katsuhiko with the assumption
that the polymer obeys the power law fluid model and
derived the velocity field, volume flow rate, thickness of
coated wire, average velocity, the force on the total wire
surface and linearly varying temperature distribution in
the direction of flow. As the posttreatment problem is
mainly concern with temperature for cooling the coated
wire therefore due to its importance and realization of
AM

R. A. SHAH ET AL.

physical problem we discussed some cases of linearly

varying temperature for analysis of temperature distribution as follows:
Temperature of the wire is constant while it is varying
linearly on the surface of the coated wire.
Temperature of the wire varying linearly while it is
constant on the surface of the coated wire.
Temperature of the wire and the surface of coated wire
are varying linearly at the same temperature gradient.
The non-linear differential equations governing the
model are made dimensionless and solved for velocity
and temperature distribution. Theoretical analysis on the
drag flow mechanism of polymer extrudate, in the heat
treatment process, is presented.

2. Basic Governing Equations

The basic equations governing the flow of an incompressible fluid with thermal effects are:
u 0 ,

(1)

Du
divT f ,
Dt

cp

(2)

D
k 2 S L
Dt

(3)

where u is the velocity vector, is the constant density, f is the body force, T is the Cauchy stress tensor,
D Dt denote the material derivative, is the fluid
temperature, k is the thermal conductivity, c p is the
specific heat and L is the gradient of velocity vector
u.
The Cauchy stress tensor T is defined as
T pI S ,

331

3. Formulation and Solution of the Problem

In wire coating process, the quality of the polymer and
wire drawing velocity are important within the die, after
leaving the die temperature and the shape of the transverse sectioning is also very important. Consider the flow
of the polymer extrudate given in Figure 1, denoted by
the solid line. To analyze the flow behavior of a polymer
used in wire coating, it is convenient to divide the flow
transversely into many short sections as shown by broken
lines in Figure 1 with the assumption that each section
has almost the same shape, we analyze only one section
because each section can be assumed to be approximately
of the shape shown in Figure 2 and readily analyzable.
Consider the wire of radius R1 is dragged in the z
direction with velocity V1 through an incompressible
polymer satisfying power law fluid model (II) and the
gas (III) surrounding the polymer (II) is flowing with a
velocity V2 in the z direction.
Consider the cylindrical coordinates r , , z such
that r is perpendicular to the direction of flow.
Assume that:
1) The flow is incompressible due to the high viscosity
of the polymer.
2) Polymer II holds the power law fluid model for
shear rate.
3) In Figure 2 the wire I, the polymer II and gas III are
in contact with each other and consider no slippage occurs along the contacting surfaces of the wire, polymer,
and the gas.
Also assume that the flow is steady, laminar, unidirectional and axisymmetric:
Polymer

(4)

In which p is the pressure, I is the identity tensor

and S is the extra stress tensor. For power law fluid
model S is defined as
S A1 ,

(5)

Metal wire

where

Die

:
0

n 1
2

; 0.5 u u

(6)

where : is the scalar invariant, is the coefficient of viscosity of the fluid, T in superscript denotes
the transpose of the matrix u , 0 is the consistency
index and n is the power law index. The index n is
non-dimensional and the dimension of 0 depends on
the value of n . The parameter n subdivide fluids into
pseudoplastic fluids n 1 , dilatant fluids n 1 and
Newtonian fluid For n 1 . Therefore the deviation of
n from unity indicates the degree of deviation from
Newtonian behavior [12].
Copyright 2013 SciRes.

Figure 1. Schematic profile of polymer extrudate in wire

coating.
Free surface
Gas III

v = v2
Ploymer II
r = R2

Metal wire I
r = R1

v = v1
r=0

Figure 2. Drag flow in wire coating.

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R. A. SHAH ET AL.

332

We seek the velocity field of the form

u 0, 0, w r , S S r .

(7)

(8)

w V2 at r R2 .

In the flow through the tube, the scalar invariant is:

w
: 2
r

d2 1 d
dw

g 0

2
r
d
r
d
r
dr

n 1

c p wA k

then the boundary conditions for the problem become

w V1 at r R1 ,

where A is the temperature gradient.

Substituting Equation (17) into Equation (16), we have

(18)

Now first the velocity field is determined from Equation (15) and then the temperature distribution can be
easily calculated using Equation (18).
The average velocity is

(9)

wave

2
R R22
2
1

R2

rw r dr

(19)

Substituting Equation (9) into Equation (6) one obtains:

n 1
w
0 .
(10)
r

At some control surface downstream, the volume flow

rate of coating is

Using the velocity field (7) the continuity Equation (1)

is satisfied identically, and the non zero components of
Equation (5) with the help of Equation (10) become:

where Rc is the radius of the coated wire.

The volume flow rate of the polymer is

dw
Srz 0

dr

p
0
r

(12)

p
0

(13)

(15)

and the energy Equation (3) becomes:

D
dw
k 2 0

Dt
dr

n 1

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

(20)

R2

2rw r dr

(21)

The thickness of the coated wire can be obtained from

Equations (16) and (17) as

2
Rc R12
V
1

2
rw r dr .
R1

R2

(22)

The force on the wire is computed by determining the

shear stress at the wire surface. This is given by
Srz

r R1

dw
0

dr

(23)

.
r R1

The force on the total wire surface is

Fw 2R1 LSrz

(24)

r R1

Introduce the dimensionless parameters

r

r
w
g
, w , G
,
n 1
R1
V1
0V1 kR1n1

c AR
S
V

n 1
1
p
n
0 1

(25)

R
V
, 2 1, 2 U
R1
V1

Equations (8), (15) and (18)-(25) after dropping the

take the following form:
d dw
r

dr dr

0,

(26)

(16)

w 1 1, and w U ,

(17)

For linearly varying temperature, consider

r , z Az g r ,

R1

(14)

If the z-axis is chosen correspond to the direction of

increasing pressure, polymer (II) moves in the minus
dw
,
direction of the z-axis and the shear rate 0
dr
becomes plus for all value of r. Therefore, the absolute
value of Equation (5) can be discarded.
Equation (14) represents the flow due to pressure gradient. After leaving the die, there is only drag flow.
Hence, we consider
d
dw
r0

dr
dr

(11)

n
p d
dw
r0

z dr
dr

cp

Q V1 Rc2 R12

Substituting the velocity field and Equation (11) in the

momentum Equation (2) neglecting the body force take
the form:

R1

d 2 G dG
dw

dr 2 dr
dr

(27)

n 1

Srw ,

(28)

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R. A. SHAH ET AL.

wave R22 R12

wave

rw r dr ,
2 R12V1
1

rw r dr ,
2R12V1 1

(30)

R
Rc c 1 2 rw r dr ,
R1
1

Srz

r 1

S R
V

dw

dr

F R n 1
dw
Fw w 1 n

2 LV1
dr

(31)

(32)

,
r 1

(33)

,
r 1

The solution to (26) corresponding to the boundary

conditions (27) are:

nn1

r 1
w r U 1 n 1 1, for n 1
n 1

(34)

For n 1 , the velocity field can be obtain from Equation (26).

ln r
1,
(35)
w r U 1
ln
where the superscript means the case of n 1 .
For n 1 the average velocity is obtained from Equations (29) and (34):

n 1
1

wave 2 1 1 U 1 n 1

2n

3n 1 2 1

nn1
1 1

(36)

For n 1 the average velocity is obtained from

Equations (29) and (35):
1

2 1
wave
2

1
1
1 U 1 1 2

2
ln

(37)

For n 1 the shear rate can be obtained from Equation (34):

1
dw n 1 U 1 n
(38)

n 1 1 r
dr n
n

For n 1 the shear rate is obtained from Equation

(35) as:

1
dw n 1 U 1 n

dr n nn1 1

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

The thickness of the coated wire for n 1 is obtained

from Equations (31) and (34):
1

Rc 1 2 2 1

1 U 1

n 1
n

1
2

n
rz 1
n
0 1 r 1

(29)

333

(39)

2
nn1
2n

1
1
,

3n 1 2 1

(40)

Similarly, the thickness of the coated wire for n 1

is obtained from Equations (31) and (35):

Rc 1 2 2 1
2

1 U 1

1
1
1 2
.

2 ln

(41)

In a similar manner, the force on the total wire surface

for power law index n is not equal to 1 is
n

n 1 U 1

,
Fw
n n 1 1
n

(42)

and the force on the total wire surface for the case when
the power law index n is equal to 1 is given by
n

U 1
Fw
.
ln

(43)

In dimensionless form the volume flow rate for n is

or is not equal to 1are the same as the average velocity in
Equations (37) and (36) respectively.
In case of transformation of our problem to original
parameters the results of velocity field, volume flow rate,
average velocity and rate of shear stress are transformed
to the results of Kasajima and Katsuhiko Ito [11] for n
is or is not equal to 1.
Figure 3 illustrates the well known effect of n on
the velocity profile; i.e. for pseudoplastic the profile becomes progressively flatter; and for dilatant fluids the
profile becomes progressively linear.
Keeping the importance of temperature in our problem
we are seeking the temperature distribution with different
cases.
Case 1. Temperature of the wire is constant while it is
varying linearly on the surface of the coated wire:
Here, consider the temperature of the wire is 0 , and
it is Az on the surface of the coated wire, so from
Equation (17) we have
1, z Az g 1 0 ,
, z Az g Az

(44)

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R. A. SHAH ET AL.

334
1.0

Under the above consideration Equation (17) gives

1, z Az g 1 Az ,

n0.2
n0.6
n0.8
n1.2
n1.4
n1.8

0.9

wr

0.8
0.7

(48)

, z Az g 1

After transformation of the boundary conditions (48)

for the non-dimensional temperature distribution G
takes the following form
G 1 0, G J

0.6

(49)

where

0.5
1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 3. The velocity profile for different index n taking

2, U 0.5.

After transformation we obtain

G 1 H , G 0

(45)

where
H

0 Az

n 1
0 1

kR1n 1

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (23) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
the boundary conditions (45), we obtain the expression
for temperature distribution in form of G as:

S
U 1
ln r 2

1
1 n1 r 2 1

2
ln

n 1
2

3n 1
3n 1

U 1 n n
ln r n
r
1
S n1

3n 1
ln
(46)
n 1

G r

n 1

n 1
U 1
ln r
n n
n1
r 1

n
n 1
ln
1
ln r
H 1

ln

n 1
n

S U 1 2
ln r 2

1
1
r 1
4
ln
ln

S U 1 2
ln r
2

r ln r H 1

4 ln
ln

n 1
0 1

kR1n 1

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (22) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
the boundary conditions (49), we have
G r

S
U 1
ln r 2

1 n1 r 2 1
1

2
ln

n 1

3 n 1
U 1 n n
ln r
S n1
1
r

n
3n 1
ln
1

U 1
n1
n

1
ln r
J
ln

n 1

n 1

n1
ln r
r n 1

ln

3nn1
1

(50)

nn1
1

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (24) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
the boundary conditions (49), we have
ln r 2
S U 1 2

1
1
r 1
4
ln
ln

S U 1 2
ln r
2

r ln r J
4 ln
ln

G r

(47)

(51)

Case 3. Temperature of the wire and the surface of

coated wire are varying linearly at the same temperature
gradient:
Consider the temperatures at the surface of wire and
on the surface of continuum are Az .
From Equation (17), we have
1, z Az g 1 Az ,

Case 2. Temperature of the wire varying linearly while

it is constant on the surface of the coated wire:
In this case, consider the temperature at the surface of
wire is 1 , and Az on the surface of continuum.
Copyright 2013 SciRes.

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (24) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
the boundary conditions (45), the explicit function for
G is obtained for temperature field as:
G r

1 Az

, z Az g r Az

(52)

After simplification according to demand of our problem, we obtain

G 1 0, G 0

(53)

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (22) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
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R. A. SHAH ET AL.
1.0

the boundary conditions (53), we have

S
U 1
ln r 2

1 n1 r 2 1
1

2
ln

n 1
2

U 1 n
S n 1

3n 1
n 1
3 n 1
3n 1

ln r n
r n 1
1

ln

0.2

(54)

n 1

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 4. The velocity profile for different values of velocity

ratio U taking index n 0.1 and 2.
0.0

S U 1 2
ln r 2

1
1
r 1
4
ln
ln

S U 1 2
2

r ln r
4 ln

dr

dw

0.5

For n 1 the velocity field from Equation (24) is

substitute in Equation (22) and solved corresponding to
the boundary conditions (53), after simplification we
have

0.6

0.4

U 1
n
n 1
n
n 1
1
n 1
n 1

ln r n
r n 1
1

ln

U0.2
U0.3
U0.4
U0.5
U0.6
U0.7

0.8

wr

G r

G r

335

U0.2
U0.3
U0.4
U0.5
U0.6
U0.7

1.0
1.5
2.0
1.0

(55)

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 5. The shear rate for different values of velocity ratio

U taking index n 0.1 and 2.
1.4
1.2

The posttreatment of wire coating analysis are carried out

for power law model fluid. The velocity field, volume
flow rate, average velocity, force on the total wire,
thickness of coated wire and shear rate have been derived
for n is or is not equal to 1. In posttreatment problem
the temperature is extremely important for cooling the
wire. Therefore, regarding the importance of temperature
we have discussed three cases for linearly varying temperature. Expression for temperature distributions in
non-dimensional form are obtained for n 1 and n 1 .
The interpretations of the results are carried out under the
influence of non-dimensional parameters. It is concluded
that the velocity decreases as the power law index n
increases. In addition, the non-Newtonian parameter
decrease the fluid velocity. Also, it is concluded that the
force on the coated wire increases as the velocity ratio
increases and decreases while increases . It is observed
that for n 1 the thickness of coated wire increases.
Moreover, with a linearly varying wall temperature along
the direction of flow the highest temperature rise in the
centre of the channel depends on the dimensionless
number S . One can see the behavior of the physical
quantities such as velocity function, non-dimensional
function of temperature profile and the differential form
of these functions from Figures 3-15.

1.0

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

Fw

4. Conclusion

0.8

n0.2

0.6

n0.5

0.4

n0.8
n1.2

0.2
0.0

n1.5
1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 6. Force Fw is plotted against U for different values

of n by taking 2.
6

1.5
5

2
4

Rc

2.5
3
2
1
0
0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

Figure 7. Radius of coated wire Rc is plotted against

n for different values of by taking U 1.2.

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R. A. SHAH ET AL.

336

10

2.0

n0.4
n0.6
n0.8
n1.2
n1.4
n1.8

1.0

Gr

Rc

1.5

1.5

0.5

2.5
0.0
1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 8. Radius of coated wire Rc is plotted against n for

different values of by taking U 1.2.

Figure 12. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of n taking J 10, U 0.6, S 5 and 2.
4

10

H0.05
H0.1
H0.3
H0.5
H0.7
H0.9

n0.2

n0.5
n0.8

n1.2

Gr

n1.5

1
0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

S 0.05
S 0.1
S 0.15
S 0.2
S 0.25
S 0.3

0.04

Gr

0.03

0.05

Figure 13. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of H taking J = 4, U = 0.6, S = 25, n = 0.5 and 2.

Gr

Figure 9. Volume flow rate is plotted against U for different values of power law index n by taking 2.

n0.5
n0.6
n0.7
n1.4
n1.6
n1.8

0.02

3
0.01

0.00
1.0

1.2

1.4

2.0

1.6

1.8

2.0

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 10. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of non-dimensional parameter S taking n 0.5,
u 0.5, H 0.05 and 2.

Figure 14. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of n taking J 0.5, U 0.6, S 10 and 2.
0.0

H0.05
H0.1
H0.3
H0.5
H0.7
H0.9

0.4

0.2

S 2
S 4
S 6
S 8
S 10
S 12

0.4
0.5
0.6

0.2

0.0

0.3

0.6

Gr

0.8

Gr

0.1

1.0

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 11. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of H taking n 0.5, u 0.5, H 0.15 and 2.

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

Figure 15. The non-dimensional function G for different

values of non-dimensional parameter S taking J 2,
U 0.3, n 0.4 and 2.

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R. A. SHAH ET AL.

337

5. Acknowledgements

[7]

The first author is thankful to higher education commission of Pakistan for funding in MS leading to PhD studies under the 5000 indigenous scholarship scheme BatchIV.

S. Akter and M. S. J. Hashmi, Plasto-Hydrodynamic

Pressure Distribution in a Tepered Geometry Wire Coating Unit, Proceedings of the 14th Conference of the Irish
Manufacturing Committee Dublin, Vol. 37, No. 3, 1997,
pp. 331-340.

[8]

A. M. Siddiqui, T. Haroon and H. Khan, Wire Coating

Extrusion in a Pressure-Type Die in Flow of a Third
Grade Fluid, International Journal of Nonlinear Sciences and Numerical Simulation, Vol. 10. No. 2, 2009, pp.
247-257.

[9]

R. T. Fenner and J. G. Williams, Rheological Analysis

of Stabilizing Forces in Wire Coating Analysis, Trans.
Plastic Inst. London, Vol. 35, 1967, pp. 701-706.

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AM