Incorporating the wedging effect in a new packing model

Abstract

The prediction of packing density of a granular system is of major importance in many branches of science and engineering. For the prediction of packing density, a number of packing models have been developed. However, the theoretically predicted maximum packing density of a binary mix of mono-sized particles is often higher than that obtained by measurement. As the existing packing models have already taken into account the various known effects, such as the filling and loosening effects of the finer particles and the occupying and wall effects of the coarser particles, the significant discrepancies between the predicted and measured results cannot be explained by any of the known effects. It is postulated herein that such discrepancies are caused by an effect called the wedging effect and that with this effect incorporated into a new 3-parameter packing model, we can better understand the packing structure of particles and improve the accuracy of our theoretical predictions.