Liquid drop splashing on smooth, rough, and textured surfaces

Splashing occurs when a liquid drop hits a dry solid surface at high velocity. We report experimental studies of how the splash depends on the roughness and the texture of the surfaces as well as the viscosity of the liquid. For smooth surfaces, there is a "corona" splash caused by the presence of air surrounding the drop. There are several regimes that occur as the velocity and liquid viscosity are varied. There is also a "prompt" splash that depends on the roughness and texture of the surfaces. A measurement of the size distribution of the ejected droplets is sensitive to the surface roughness. For a textured surface in which pillars are arranged in a square lattice, experiment shows that the splashing has a fourfold symmetry. The splash occurs predominantly along the diagonal directions. In this geometry, two factors affect splashing the most: the pillar height and spacing between pillars.