Effect of channel width on the primary instability of inclined film flow

A procedure is developed to detect the onset of interfacial instability in inclined film flows (with estimated accuracy better than 5%) and is used to show that the finite width of experimental channels stabilizes the undisturbed liquid film. Deviation from the classical prediction scales inversely with the product of channel width and sine of inclination angle, and for small inclinations and/or narrow channels is of the order of 100%. The effect is tentatively attributed to the influence of sidewalls on the traveling disturbances, which results in curved crestlines and transverse variation of wave characteristics.