A geometric interpolation scheme for dynamic wetting in 3D VOF simulations
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Wetting phenomena are known to strongly influence the behavior of droplets or bubbles at surfaces, thereby impacting many industrial applications and also daily life. In numerical simulations to predict the behavior, often simplified modeling has been used, neglecting contact angle dynamics and hysteresis. This work presents a three-dimensional framework for simulating dynamic wetting phenomena using the volume of fluid (VOF) method, implemented in Basilisk [1]. A geometric interpolation scheme is developed to obtain an accurate and reliable value of the contact line velocity. To capture realistic wetting dynamics, a dynamic contact angle model is integrated that considers also contact angle hysteresis [2]. Our framework allows for a three-dimensional evolution of the contact line if axial symmetry does not hold true [3]. The approach is validated against various experimental results of droplet spreading and sliding and demonstrates quantitative agreement with the wetting behavior observed. Additionally, a comparative analysis between dynamic and static contact angle models is performed. A validation example of droplet splashing is shown in Fig. 1 [3,4].
