ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING WITH LIQUID LATEX AND RECYCLED END-OF-LIFE RUBBER

Elastomers and rubber are common industrial materials used for test objects, supporting parts, and many other commercial products. The industrial processing of these materials is currently dominated by injection molding, which reduces manufacturing costs and speeds up production. However, this manufacturing method does not permit personalization or customization and lacks the versatility of other techniques such as three-dimensional printing. Understandably, there has been a move toward additive manufacturing (AM) with elastomers. This work proposes a new approach to AM with liquid latex, using a drop-on-demand (DoD) based inkjet to fabricate latex patterns. The printhead actuator benefits from a higher material compatibility compared to conventional inkjet/extrusion-based printers, allowing the jetting of viscous fluids, as well as liquids with high solid loading. The setup allows printing with viscous liquid latex of a high solid content (60 wt. %). The process is controllable and reliable, making the printing of patterns possible. In addition, we explore printing with micronized rubber powder (MRP) made from end-of-life tires, to test solid-particle loading compatibility and as a novel method for rubber recycling. In this study, we demonstrate that large-scale DoD inkjet printing is capable of handling solid particle loadings of up to 10 wt. % in addition to the high solid content liquid latex. Moreover, multilayer objects were created from pure liquid latex, as well as from MRP/latex suspensions. Material characterization indicates that the stiffness of cured latex is not altered by the addition of MRP, but reduces the maximum elongation length from 750% to 430%. The results highlight the ability to print with both high particle loading and large particles. This explorative study demonstrates the potential of AM processes with liquid latex, as well as a new approach to tire rubber reuse

The Effect of Surface Roughness on the Contact Line and Splashing Dynamics of Impacting Droplets

Whether a droplet splashes upon impact onto a solid is known to depend not only on the fluid properties and its speed, but also on the substrate characteristics. Past research has shown that splashing is heavily influenced by the substrate roughness. Indeed, in this manuscript, we demonstrate that splashing is ruled by the surface roughness, the splashing ratio, and the dynamic contact angle. Experiments consist of water and ethanol droplets impacting onto solid substrates with varying degrees of roughness. High speed imaging is used to extract the dynamic contact angle as a function of the spreading speed for these impacting droplets. During the spreading phase, the dynamic contact angle achieves an asymptotic maximum value, which depends on the substrate roughness and the liquid properties. We found that this maximum dynamic contact angle, together with the liquid properties, the ratio of the peak to peak roughness and the surface feature mean width, determines the splashing to no-splashing threshold. In addition, these parameters consistently differentiate the splashing behaviour of impacts onto smooth hydrophilic, hydrophobic and superhydrophobic surfaces

The Role of the Dynamic Contact Angle on Splashing

In this letter we study the splashing behaviour of droplets upon impact onto a variety of substrates with different wetting properties, ranging from hydrophilic to super-hydrophobic surfaces. In particular, we study the effects of the dynamic contact angle on splashing. The experimental approach uses high-speed imaging and image analysis to recover the apparent contact angle as a function of the spreading speed. Our results show that neither the Capillary number nor the so-called splashing parameter are appropriate to characterise the splashing behaviour under these circumstances. However, we show that the maximum dynamic advancing contact angle and the splashing ratio β adequately characterise the splashing behaviour

On the analysis of the contact angle for impacting droplets using a polynomial fitting approach

ractical considerations on the measurement of the dynamic contact angle and the spreading diameter of impacting droplets are discussed in this paper. The contact angle of a liquid is commonly obtained either by a polynomial or a linear fitting to the droplet profile around the triple phase point. Previous works have focused on quasi-static or sessile droplets, or in cases where inertia does not play a major role on the contact angle dynamics. Here, we study the effect of droplet shape, the order of the fitting polynomial, and the fitting domain, on the measurement of the contact angle on various stages following droplet impact where the contact line is moving. Our results, presented in terms of the optical resolution and the droplet size, show that a quadratic fitting provides the most consistent results for a range of various droplet shapes. As expected, our results show that contact angle values are less sensitive to the fitting conditions for the cases where the droplet can be approximated to a spherical cap. Our experimental conditions include impact events with liquid droplets of different sizes and viscosities on various substrates. In addition, validating past works, our results show that the maximum spreading diameter can be parameterised by the Weber number and the rapidly advancing contact angle

Controlling droplet splashing and bouncing by dielectrowetting

Stopping droplets from bouncing or splashing after impacting a surface is fundamental in preventing cross-contamination, and the spreading of germs and harmful substances. Here we demonstrate that dielectrowetting can be applied to actively control the dynamics of droplet impact. Moreover, we demonstrate that dielectrowetting can be used to prevent droplet bouncing and suppress splashing. In our experiments, the dielectrowetting effect is produced on a flat substrate by two thin interdigitated electrodes connected to an alternating current potential. Our findings show that the strength of the electric potential can affect the dynamic contact angle and regulate the spreading, splashing and receding dynamics at the right time-scales

Droplet splashing on curved substrates

Droplets impacting dry solid substrates often splash above a certain threshold impact velocity. We hypothesise that substrate curvature alters splashing thresholds due to a modification to the lift force acting on the lamella at the point of breakup. We have undertaken high-speed imaging experiments of millimetric droplets impacting convex and concave surfaces to establish splashing thresholds and dynamics across a wide range of substrate geometries and impact conditions. Our findings indicate that the tendency of droplets to splash is proportional to the reciprocal of the substrate’s radius of curvature, independent of whether the substrate is convex or concave, with it being harder for droplets to splash on small spheres. Moreover, we consistently parameterise the axisymmetric splashing threshold across all curved substrate geometries via a modification to the well-known splashing ratio. Finally, the splashing dynamics resulting from initial asymmetry between the impacting droplet and curved substrate are also elucidated

Droplet splashing on curved substrates.

Droplets impacting dry solid substrates often splash above a certain threshold impact velocity. We hypothesise that substrate curvature alters splashing thresholds due to a modification to the lift force acting on the lamella at the point of breakup. We have undertaken high-speed imaging experiments of millimetric droplets impacting convex and concave surfaces to establish splashing thresholds and dynamics across a wide range of substrate geometries and impact conditions. Our findings indicate that the tendency of droplets to splash is proportional to the reciprocal of the substrate's radius of curvature, independent of whether the substrate is convex or concave, with it being harder for droplets to splash on small spheres. Moreover, we consistently parameterise the axisymmetric splashing threshold across all curved substrate geometries via a modification to the well-known splashing ratio. Finally, the splashing dynamics resulting from initial asymmetry between the impacting droplet and curved substrate are also elucidated