Elastic liquid jet impaction on a high-speed moving surface

Abstract

In the railroad industry a friction-modifying non-Newtonian liquid, showing elastic behavior, may be applied to the rail in the form of a liquid jet. The interaction of this elastic liquid jet and the moving surface—specifically whether it splashes or adheres without splash—is important in this industrial application. Twelve different elastic liquids with widely varying relaxation times were tested to isolate the effect of elasticity from other fluid properties. Using high-speed imaging, the interaction between the impinging jet and the moving surface could be captured and analyzed. Although similar to Newtonian jets, for which the Reynolds number plays a major role, the Deborah number was also salient to the splash of elastic liquids. At the elevated Weber numbers of the testing, the Weber number had a much smaller impact on splash than did the Reynolds or Deborah numbers. The ratio of the surface velocity to the jet velocity has only a small effect on the splash. © 2012 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2012