Electrohydrodynamics of dielectric droplet collision with variant wettability surfaces

TL;DR

This study investigates how electric fields influence the impact, rebound, and spreading behavior of dielectric droplets on superhydrophobic and hydrophilic surfaces, revealing new regimes and a predictive model for droplet dynamics.

Contribution

It introduces a semi analytical model for electric field-induced droplet rebound and explores the effects of electric fields on droplet impact across different wettability surfaces.

Findings

Electric field suppresses droplet rebound on superhydrophobic surfaces at fixed Weber number.

High electro-capillary numbers cause droplets to retract faster along the electric field direction.

A phase map explains droplet dynamics across various impact conditions.

Abstract

In this article, we report experimental and semi analytical findings to elucidate the electrohydrodynamics EHD of a dielectric liquid droplet impact on superhydrophobic SH and hydrophilic surfaces. A wide range of Weber numbers We and electro-capillary numbers Cae is covered to explore the various regimes of droplet impact EHD. We show that for a fixed We 60, droplet rebound on SH surface is suppressed with increase of electric field intensity. At high Cae, instead of the usual uniform radial contraction, the droplets retract faster in orthogonal direction to the electric field and spread along the direction of the electric field. This prevents the accumulation of sufficient kinetic energy to achieve the droplet rebound phenomena. For certain values of We and Ohnesorge number Oh, droplets exhibit somersault like motion during rebound. Subsequently we propose a semi analytical model to explain the field induced rebound phenomenon on SH surfaces. Above a critical Cae 4.0, EHD instability causes fingering pattern via evolution of spire at the rim. Further, the spreading EHD on both hydrophilic and SH surfaces are discussed. On both wettability surfaces and for a fixed We, the spreading factor shows an increasing trend with increase in Cae. We have formulated an analytical model based on energy conservation to predict the maximum spreading diameter. The model predictions hold reasonably good agreement with the experimental observations. Finally, a phase map was developed to explain the post impact droplet dynamics on SH surfaces for a wide range of We and Cae.