Abstract
The formation of ordered and disordered cakes of monodispersed PSL particles by constant-pressure filtration is investigated. It is found that ordering occurs under the condition where the transition of a dispersed phase of particles to an ordered one, like the Alder transition, takes place above the cake surface, and that common cakes are composed of both disordered and ordered domains with specific cake resistances of 0.9 × 1013 and 1.5 × 1013 m/kg respectively. An equation for a constant-pressure filtration in which the dependence of the cake structure on the flow rate is taken into account is proposed and is found to be successfully applicable to cakes composed of ordered and disordered domains.