Emulsions from aerosol sprays

An electrostatic emulsification apparatus has been designed for the purpose of studying diffusion from oil droplets which have a mean size in the range of similar to 1.5-3.5 mu m, with standard deviations of 40-50%. The emulsification technique involves the collection of a spray of electrically charged oil droplets onto a rotating water film which is sustained from a reservoir. In this way, emulsions with volume fractions of approximately 10(-3) are produced within several minutes at oil flow rates of around 10(-2) mi min(-1). Phase-Doppler anemometry (PDA) was used to assess droplet size distributions for the sprays and emulsions. Results show that the mean emulsion droplet size was smaller than the mean spray droplet size by several orders of magnitude. At flow rates around 10(-2) mi min(-1), the spray droplet size distribution was little affected by the applied potential between about -4.20 and -4.65 kV (mean droplet size between similar to 7.6 and 7.8 mu m, with standard deviations of similar to 20%), whereas the mean droplet size of the corresponding emulsion decreased more rapidly with applied potential. Above an applied potential of similar to-4.30 kV, which corresponded to an emulsion droplet size below approximately 2 mu m, the measured volume fraction of the emulsion decreased with respect to the volume fraction as calculated on the basis of total amount of injected oil. (C) 1997 Academic Press.