4. Results and discussion
4.1 Experimental data
4.1.1 Relationship between flowability and packing
density
Figure 6 shows the relationship between FFc and packing density as a
function of blend composition. It can be observed that the FFc of any
binary mixture is lower than that of each of the primary components of
the system. A similar phenomenon was observed by
Vallejo12, who attributed this behavior to the
increase in solid fraction of the blend and particle configuration. That
work investigated relatively larger sizes of glass bead mixtures, with
nominal sizes of small and large particles reported as 400 and 5000 µm,
respectively, and did so at consolidation stresses between 6 and 40
times larger than those employed here.