In this work, we relate the self-diffusion coefficient to the residual entropy of the system according to the free volume theory and scaling principle The viscosity equation for a freely Jointed Lennard-Jones chain fluid is then obtained from the expression of self-diffusion coefficient by applying the Stokes-Einstein equation The real polyatomic compounds are modeled as chains of tangent Lennard-Jones segments The segment size and energy parameter as well as chain length (expressed by the number of segments) are obtained from the experimental viscosity data The proposed viscosity equation reproduces the experimental viscosity data with an average absolute deviation of 5 12% for 18 polyatomic compounds (1600 data points) over wide ranges of temperature and pressure For engineering applications, the generalized model parameters for normal alkanes with the number of carbon atoms n > 3 are proposed. The segment energy parameter is suggested to be evaluated from the critical temperature, and the segment size parameter and chain length are correlated with the number of carbon atoms in an alkane molecule (C) 2010 Elsevier B V All rights reserved