Eur. Phys. J. E (2005) 17: 237-246
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2004-10144-7

Regular Articles

Shearing behavior of polydisperse media

Institute for Computational Physics, University of Stuttgart, Pfaffenwaldring 27, 70569, Stuttgart, Germany

^* e-mail: M.Wackenhut@ica1.uni-stuttgart.de
^** e-mail: S.McNamara@ica1.uni-stuttgart.de
^*** e-mail: H.J.Herrmann@ica1.uni-stuttgart.de

Received: 29 July 2004
Accepted: 19 April 2005
Published online: 27 May 2005

Abstract

We study the shearing of polydisperse and bidisperse media with a size ratio of 10. Simulations are performed with a two-dimensional shear cell using contact dynamics. With a truncated power law for the polydisperse media we find that they show a stronger dilatancy and greater resistance to shearing than bidisperse mixtures. To model additives used to control viscosity we introduce so-called “point-like particles”. Even changing the kinematic behavior very little, the point-like particles reduce the force necessary to maintain a fixed shearing velocity.