A Study of Splashes

UENCE OF

gh," "basket" splash taking down much air and throwing up a tall and conspicuous jet. Thus in the fourth figure of Series XI, in which the height of fall has been increased from 15 to 60 cm. (i.e. from 6 inches to 2 feet), the sphere being of polished ivory, we s

ed by the radial stri?. To the meeting of these converging streams we must attribute the large access of liquid that is forced up into t

IES

tim. in diameter, falling 60 c

=

2 se

04

1 se

45

62

m. the characteristic sheath of the "smooth" splash is no longer so closely fitting even at an early stage, but is beginning

ched by means of photograph

ollowed by the particles. Each particle must have travelled in a nearly straight line from the moment it left the surface of the sphere, and must still be mo

HE CONDITION O

t the equilibrium of the splash, if I may use the phrase, is, at this high velocity of entry (564 cm. per sec., or about 18 feet per sec.), very unstable, and was found to depend on minute differences in

IES

serpentine falling 100 cen

01

02

taken down. This observation at 137·5 cm. was repeated three times, observer C. doing the polishing. Then observer W. polished, and the splash was first nearly airless and then quite airless. Th

ndkerchief A, and 'none at all, or only very little,' when rubbed with clean handkerchief B. This result was confirmed four times with B and five with A. These handker

reated in exactly the same way, falling 22 cm. into paraffin oil, one would always take down much air and the

7), was allowed to fall wet into the liquid, all other circumstances remaining the same, the splash of Series XIII, p. 103, was obtained, which is entirely different from the first. The wetting was effected by dipping the sphere into the bowl o

THE NATURE

influence in determining whether at a given

ith water, a fall of 160 cm. (over 5 feet) could be reached. The paraffin oil used in these experiments had, at a temperature of 12°·5 centigrade, a specific gravity ·840 and a surface-tension about ·39 of that of wat

lashes observed. When the glycerine was increased to six volumes in fifty-one of water, though this made the viscosity half as great again, the change was noticeable but still slight, the chief difference being, with a smooth sphere, the greater salience of the ribs or flutings in some of the earl

IES

a smooth w

03

5 se

37

loped on the left-hand side; but these details have proved rather too delicate for reproduction in the plate. Two photographs taken of stage 2 had each of them an isolated jet, owing probably to the fact that when working with so sticky a liquid it was difficult to avoid contaminating the cloth on which the sphere was each time repolish

ceedings are uneventful, as a glance at the series will show. With the same height of fall into water we should have had an exquisite crater fringed with a mul

lling 15 centim. into wa

IES

lling 75 centim. into pu

IES

75 centim. into pure

01

02

03

ENCE OF T

ed difference was produced. With the sphere hot, the height of fall can be much increased before the splash becomes "rough." Thus

AME HELD NEAR THE LIQUID, AND TR

nd a cold sphere, it rose from 157 cm. to over 258 cm., which was the greatest height that the laboratory would permit. Either the luminous flame of a bat's-wing burner or the flame of a Bunsen burner held nearly horizontal produces the effect, provided the flame is held near enough to the surface of the liquid, and it is a

ELECTRIFICATION T

for a flame would certainly discharge completely any electrified sphere passing through it, and it appeared

my readers to enter, to prove that this tempting explanation was untenable, and that

ENTS IN

be settled by removing the air and letting the spheres, whether rough or smooth, fall through a v

ial influence on the early course of the splash, and that a sphere which gives a "smooth" splash in air wi

TNO

y minute bubbles liberated by electrolysis at two electrodes placed in the liquid. These streams, initially straight and vertical, were displaced and distorted as the

al precautions for which the reader who desires details is referred to the