THE MIXING EFFECT ON THE FREE-RADICAL MMA SOLUTION POLYMERIZATION

Mathematical models of reactors for the polymerization of methylmethac rylate (MMA) have been developed and analyzed to elucidate reactor dyn amics and to determine conditions for improved operation. The effects of mixing and heat transfer in an MMA polymerization reactor system ha ve been explored by the development of an imperfect mixing model. To m odel imperfect mixing in polymerization, a reactor configuration using two tanks in parallel was used. Bifurcation diagrams developed using numerical analysis of the model have been drawn with two variable para meters, an exchange ratio, sigma, and a volume ratio, kappa.We use fee d and coolant temperatures as bifurcation parameters. If variable para meters are small, the lower solution branch of the steady state soluti ons is quite different from that of a simple model that assumes perfec t macro-mixing as bifurcation parameters change. If sigma increases (k appa=0.1, sigma=1.0), the shape of a steady state solution curve diffe rs significantly from that of a simple model as the feed temperature d ecreases.