Model of droplet shape on horizontal metal fiber in gravity field

The study observed the shape of the droplet on the surface of the horizontal metal fiber in the gravity field by building a visual test bench. The geometry parameters including droplet diameter, height, contact angle, width of contact line and height of contact line were measured. By fitting the correlations of these geometry parameters, the description equations of solid-liquid interface and gas-liquid interface were solved and an ellipsoidal droplet shape model on metal fiber was developed. The predicted shapes of droplet model are in good agreement with the droplet images obtained from the observation experiment. The predicted results can describe 98% of the experimental results within the deviation limit of ±10%, and the mean deviation is 4.6%.