The viscosity of five liquid hydrocarbons at pressures up to 250 MPa

This paper reports new measurements of the viscosity of toluene, n-pentane, n-hexane, n-octane, and n-decane at pressures up to 250 MPa in the temperature range 303 to 348 K. The measurements were performed with a vibrating-wire viscometer and with a relative method of evaluation. Calibration of the instrument was carried out with respect to reference values of the viscosity of the same liquids at their saturation vapour pressure. The viscosity measurements have a precision of ±0.1% but the accuracy is limited by that of the calibration data to be ±0.5%. The experimental data have been represented by polynomial functions of pressure for the purposes of interpolation. The data are also used as the most precise test yet applied to a representation of the viscosity of liquids based upon hard-sphere theory.