Abstract
Air bubbles entrapped in the ink channel are a major problem in piezo-driven inkjet printing. They grow by rectified diffusion and eventually counteract the pressure buildup at the nozzle, leading to a breakdown of the jetting process. Experimental results on the droplet velocity udrop as a function of the equilibrium radius R0 of the entrained bubble are presented. Surprisingly, udrop(R0) shows a pronounced maximum around R0 = 17 μm before it sharply drops to zero around R0 = 19 μm. A simple one-dimensional model is introduced to describe this counterintuitive behavior which turns out to be a resonance effect of the entrained bubble.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 121511 |
Number of pages | 7 |
Journal | Physics of fluids |
Volume | 18 |
Issue number | 12 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2006 |