Flow Formation in Couette Motion of an Elastico-Viscous Maxwell Fluid In the Presence of a Transverse Magnetic Field

Abstract

The unsteady flow of an incompressible elastico-viscous Maxwell fluid between two parallel plates, the upper one of which is fixed and the lower one is started impulsively from rest, is studied. It is assumed that a magnetic field perpendicular to the plates is present, no external electric field is imposed and the magnetic Reynold’s number is very small. Laplace transforms have been used to get the velocity field in the fluid and the skin friction at the lower plate. It is found that the elasticity of the fluid retards the fluid motion and increases the skin friction.