Factors Influencing the Rheological Behavior of Carbon Nanotube Water-Based Nanofluid

An enormous development of nanofluids in the scientific field has been observed in the past decade. A number of studies have been published on the thermal conductivity of these nanofluids. However, nanofluid viscosity is as important as thermal conductivity in several aspects. Therefore, the factors affecting the rheological properties of nanofluid are studied in this paper. Various concentration of CNT-water-based nanofluid was prepared by using SDS as stabilizing agent. The viscosity studies were made experimentally with various concentrations at different temperature ranging from 0 to 45 degrees C. Five other samples of CNT nanofluid were prepared with different Ultrasonication time. The effect of sonication time on viscosity was studied. It was observed that the shear thinning behavior is exhibited by all the samples. The empirical correlation is proposed to predict the viscosity of CNT nanofluid at different temperatures. And it was observed that the effect of sonication time on viscosity follows the power law model.