Hydrodynamics interactions of clusters of drops: a study of the coalescence phenomena with the finite volume method

TL;DR

This paper presents a finite volume numerical scheme to simulate water drop coalescence in n-heptane, analyzing how initial velocities influence outcomes like permanent coalescence and satellite drop formation, with insights into droplet dynamics.

Contribution

It introduces a novel finite volume method-based numerical scheme for simulating droplet coalescence, including surface tension effects and dynamic analysis of droplet behavior.

Findings

Different initial velocities lead to varied coalescence outcomes.

Streamline analysis reveals droplet dynamics during coalescence.

Surface tension effects influence droplet shape evolution.

Abstract

In this work has been proposed a numerical scheme with the aim of simulate the coalescence process between water drops immersed in a continuous phase (n-heptane). This numerical scheme is based in the Finite Volume method and two different values for the initial velocity of the drops were chosen. Depending of the initial velocity of collision some scenarios emerge, such as: permanent coalescence, formation of satellite drops etc. For some snap shots the streamlines are calculated for the different process of permanent coalescence. These streamlines allow the understanding of the dynamics of the droplets immersed on the n-heptane phase. The model used for the surface tension is presented and its effects on the dynamics of coalescence of the droplets are showed, which after some time tends to the spherical form.