Evolution of rivulets during spreading of an impinging water jet on a rotating, precoated substrate

Abstract

The spreading of a liquid film across a rotating surface is inherently unstable due to the centrifugal force, which causes the formation of rivulets along the spreading front. This instability produces a rich diversity of spreading patterns and is important to control for the optimization of spin-coating and spin-rinsing of silicon wafers during the fabrication of microelectronics. The present work is an experimental investigation of the evolution of rivulets arising from this instability during the spreading of an impinging water jet across a rotating substrate that is precoated with a thin, aqueous film. To characterize these rivulets, we developed a high-speed imaging apparatus and image-processing software that traces the spreading front over time. We show how the morphology of the spreading front is qualitatively affected by varying the Reynolds number of the impinging jet, the ratio of centrifugal to Coriolis forces, and the type of liquid used to precoat the substrate. For quantitative analysis of rivulets, we measured the “compactness ratio” of the spreading front, which quantifies deviation from a circular spreading front. We used the compactness ratio to demonstrate that rivulets are suppressed most strongly at low rotation rates, at high flow rates, and on substrates precoated with water, although with notable exceptions.