Mechanical Engineering Commons^™

Visualization And Characterization Of Ultrasonic Cavitating Atomizer And Other Automotive Paint Sprayers Using Infrared Thermography, Nelson Kudzo Akafuah

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The disintegration of a liquid jet emerging from a nozzle has been under investigation for several decades. A direct consequence of the liquid jet disintegration process is droplet formation. The breakup of a liquid jet into discrete droplets can be brought about by the use of a diverse forcing mechanism. Cavitation has been thought to assist the atomization process. Previous experimental studies, however, have dealt with cavitation as a secondary phenomenon assisting the primary atomization mechanism. In this dissertation, the role of the energy created by the collapse of cavitation bubbles, together with the liquid pressure perturbation is explicitly configured …