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We employ the carbon paper technique with the aim of investigating the effect of spherical-agglomerate (pellet) strength on force distributions, through confined compression of approximately 1 mm sized pellets formed from microcrystalline cellulose and polyethylene glycol. The carbon paper technique relies on the transference of imprints from compressed pellets onto white photo quality paper, which are digitised and processed via image processing software. The investigated pellets can both deform plastically and develop localised cracks in response to an applied stress, while remaining largely intact during confined compression. Our results indicate that such crack formation - henceforth referred to as fracture - has a decisive influence on force distributions. Previous work on non-fracturing systems has found that the distribution of normalized forces tends to narrow with increasing particle deformation. No narrowing is observed after the point of fracture in this study and the width of the distributions - as quantified by the standard deviation of non-normalized forces - is found to increase with the difference between non-normalized mean force and fracture force. Additional corroborative results show that spatial force-force correlations typically exhibit a marked change once the fracture force is exceeded.

We employ the carbon paper technique to aid the understanding of in die force and spatial distributions, upon compression of approximately I mm sized spherical agglomerates (pellets) of microcrystalline cellulose (MCC). The aim in this study was to test for the effect of lubricant film on force and spatial distributions. Pellets of MCC were formed via granulation and extrusion/spheronisation. Investigation of pellet bed compression was performed on a materials tester. Prior to compression studies the pellets were characterised for bulk density. size and deformability. Two pellet types were investigated; MCC and MCC lubricated with magnesium stearate. The carbon paper technique relies upon carbon paper as the medium for transferring imprints from compressed pellets onto photo quality paper. The digitised images of these imprints form the basis of analysis through the use of image processing software. Using the carbon paper technique within the range of 10-30 MPa indicates that lubrication does not have a significant effect on the distribution of forces between spherical agglomerates during uniaxial compression. Spatial analysis of the imprints revealed that the lubricated pellets exhibited a higher packing order than the unlubricated ones at low applied pressures (10 and 20 MPa), a difference that could not be observed at 30 MPa. Hence interparticle friction and/or cohesion appear to influence the initial particle rearrangement, whereas confinement is suggested to dominate at higher pressures.