A Study of Splashes

by A. M. Worthington

Roughness of the surface will be equally efficient in causing the liquid to leave the sphere. For the momentum will readily carry the liquid past the mouth of any cavities (see Fig. 20), into which it can only enter with a very sharp curvature of its path. It is to be observed that the surface-tension of the air-liquid surface of the sheath will act at all times in favour of the cohesion of the sphere, and even if the film has left the sphere the surface-tension will tend to make it close in again, but we should not be right in attributing much importance to this capillary pressure which, with finite curvatures, is a force of a lower order of magnitude than the cohesion, and, as the photographs now to be shown will clearly show, is incompetent to produce the effects observed.

Fig. 20

Having arrived at this general explanation, we proceeded to test it.

EXPERIMENTS ON THE INFLUENCE OF DUST.

In the first place, to test the influence of dust, the experiment was made of deliberately dusting the surface of the sphere. For this purpose a highly polished nickelled sphere was held in a pair of crucible tongs by an electrified person standing on an insulating stool, and by him presented to any dusty object that stood or could be brought within reach. Particles of dust soon settled on the electrified sphere, which was then carefully placed on the dropping ring with the dusty side lowest. The liquid used was paraffin oil, and the height of fall was 31·7 cm., at which this sphere when not dusted gave always a quite airless splash. When dusted an enormous bubble of air was carried down on each occasion. Although the sphere when laid on the dropping ring must have completely lost the electrical charge, yet it seemed worth while to go through the same electrifying process without dusting. The result showed that no change was produced. In order to see how far the influence of dust would go, the height of fall was now reduced, and it was found that with sphere (1) a fall of 17·1 cm. gave a perfectly rough splash when the surface was visibly dimmed with fine dust, and with a second similar sphere a fall of 16·7 cm. availed. If the surface was only slightly dusty, then at these low heights the splash remained "smooth."

It then occurred to us to try the effect of partial or local dusting, for we had already found by experimenting with a marked sphere that the method of dropping did not impart any appreciable rotation to the sphere, which reached the liquid in the attitude with which it started from the dropping ring. Accordingly, after dusting the sphere in the manner already described, the dust was carefully rubbed away from all but certain parts whose position was recorded. The experiments were very successful, and the results are shown on [page 113]. The liquid used was water, and the sphere was of polished serpentine, 2·57 centim. in diameter, falling 14 centim.

In Fig. 1 of Series XVI the sphere was dusted on the right-hand side, and a "sound of splash" was recorded. On the left side we see that there is no disturbance of the "smooth splash"; on the right is a "pocket" of air such as was obtained by accident in Series IX, Fig. 6 (see [p. 91]). The point of departure at which the liquid left the sphere is well marked, and a tangent from this point passes through the outermost conspicuous droplets that must have been projected from it.

In Fig. 2 the sphere was dusted at the top and on the right-hand side, but not much more than half-way down, and the configuration corresponds entirely to the facts. Here again a tangent from the well-marked drops on the right-hand side leads very nearly to the place of departure from the surface of the sphere.

In Fig. 3 the sphere was dusted near the bottom only. The appearance on the left-hand side seems to show that the liquid has, after leaving the sphere, again been brought within reach. This recovery at an early stage is explained by reference to photographs of Series VI ([p. 81]) of the splash of a rough sphere, which show that even the rough sphere is soon wetted for some distance up the sides, by the gradual passage of the sphere into the divergently flowing cone of liquid which surrounds the lower part. When the liquid again touches a polished part the film will be again guided up it in the manner already explained.