Abstract
Droplet motion is important in discrete microfluidic operations as well as in emerging site-specific cool- ing techniques based on electrowetting. The present work reports on carefully characterized experiments that map the shape, advancing and receding contact angles, and contact area of droplets sliding under gravitational actuation as a function of droplet size and velocity. A pseudo-Lagrangian methodology based on the Volume Of Fluid - Continuous Surface Force (VOF-CSF) model is developed to simulate drop- let motion down an incline. The model is benchmarked against 2D stationary reference-frame simula- tions. The terminal velocity of droplets on an incline is predicted and is in good agreement with in- house experimental measurements. The effect of using different contact angle models on the terminal velocity predictions is investigated. The numerical solution is highly sensitive to the contact angle bound- ary condition. The internal fluid motion in moving droplets is also explained.
Keywords
Dynamic contact angle, Terminal velocity, VOF, Contact line, Droplet shape, Droplet profile
Date of this Version
2012
DOI
doi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2011.10.028
Published in:
S. R. Annapragada, J. Y. Murthy and S. V. Garimella, “Prediction of Droplet Dynamics on an Incline,” International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 55, pp. 1466-1474, 2011.