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Estimating the Viscosity of Mixtures Neutrium

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ESTIMATING THE VISCOSITY OF MIXTURES
SUMMARY
For some engineering calculations, particularly in hydrocarbon
processing, it is necessary to estimate the viscosity of a mixture

(blend) of two or more components. This article presents the Gambill

and Refutas methods, which are commonly used in petroleum refining


for predicting the viscosity of oil blends.

1. DEFINITIONS

: Kinematic viscosity

: Mass fraction

: Volume fraction

2. GAMBILL METHOD
Gambill (1959) proposed the following equation for estimating the
kinematic viscosity of a two liquid mixture.
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Estimating the Viscosity of Mixtures Neutrium


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= xa a

+ xb

1/3
b

3. REFUTAS EQUATION
3.1 Mass Basis
Refutas (2000) proposed a method by which the kinematic viscosity
()

of a mixture of two or more liquids. In this method a Viscosity

Blending Number (VBN) of each component is first calculated and then


used to determine the VBN of the liquid mixture as shown below.
V BN i = 14.534 ln (ln ( i + 0.8)) + 10.975

The VBN of the liquid mixture is then calculated as follows:


N

V BN mixture = xi V BN i
i=0

The kinematic viscosity of the mixture can then be estimated using the
viscosity blending number of the mixture using the equation below.

mixture = exp (exp (

V BN mixture 10.975

)) 0.8

14.534

3.2 Volumetric Basis


Chevron developed an alternative formulation for the viscosity blend
index in which the volume fraction of each component may be used.

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V BI i = ln( i )/ ln(1000 i )

The VBI of each volumetric component can then be used to calculate


the VBI of the mixture as follows.
N

V BN mixture = vi V BN i
i=0

Using

V BI mixture

the viscosity of the mixture may then be calculated

as shown previously.

4. REFERENCES
1. Gambill, W.R., 1959, "How to estimate mixtures viscosities",
Chemical Engineering, 66, pg 151-152.

2. Maples, R.E., 2000, "Petroleum Refinery Process Economics",


PennWell, ISBN 978-0-87814-779-3.


ARTICLE TAGS
Blending Kinematic Viscosity

neutrium.net/fluid_flow/estimating-the-viscosity-of-mixtures/

Mixture

Viscosity

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Estimating the Viscosity of Mixtures Neutrium

Article Created: October 21, 2013

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