Rheological influences on the splashing experiment

The present paper contains a comprehensive experimental study of the impact of solid spheres and liquid droplets on liquid surfaces. Particular attent ion is paid to the effect of making the Liquids slightly non-Newtonian by a dding to a Newtonian solvent small concentrations of high molecular weight polymers such as polyacrylamide and xanthan gum and also small concentratio ns of carbon fibres. A number of multigrade oils are also studied. Of major interest is the effect of rheology on the height of the so-called Worthing ton jet, which is such a dominant feature of many 'splashing' experiments. In passing, we propose the technique as a simple and inexpensive monitor of 'resistance to extensional deformation'. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. Al l rights reserved.