Production of Uniform Droplets by Means of an Ion Drag Pump

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Abstract
An ion drag pump generates a low pressure, and, when it is excited by an ac voltage, it can be made to produce a periodic pressure of rather high frequency, when compared with mechanical pumps. The pump can be used to break a cylindrical liquid jet into uniform droplets by launching a wave on the liquid jet. The sizes of the droplets depend on the jet diameter and the frequency of pressure variations. In an experimental system, the supply voltage to the pump was varied from 175 to 2000 V, and a step‐up transformer was used to raise the low voltage oscillator output to the high voltage necessary for pump operation. From the relation between the frequency of applied voltage and the frequency of the pressure generated, it was found that the pressure was proportional to the square of the applied voltage. The method described has been used with multiorifice systems to produce multiple streams of synchronized droplets.

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