High-speed imaging of transition from fluid breakup to phase explosion in electric explosion of tungsten wires in air

Abstract

High-speed visible imaging of sub-microsecond electric explosion of wires at the low specific energy deposition threshold reveals three distinct modes of wire failure as capacitor charge voltage and energy deposition are increased. For 100 μm diameter gold-plated tungsten wires of 2 cm length, deposited energies of 1.9 eV/atom produce a liquid column that undergoes hydrodynamic breakup into droplets with radii of the order of wire diameter on timescales of 200 μs. Instability growth, column breakup, and droplet coalescence follow classical Rayleigh–Plateau predictions for instability of the viscous fluid column. Above a deposited energy of 3.2 eV/atom, wires are seen to abruptly transition to an expanding mixture of micrometer scale liquid-droplets and vapor within one frame (less than 3.33 μs), which has been termed “phase explosion” in the literature. Between these two limits, at a deposited energy of 2.5 eV/atom, the wire radius remains unchanged for the first 10 μs before the onset of a rapid expansion and disintegration that resembles homogenous nucleation of mechanically unstable bubbles. Thermodynamic calculations are presented, which separate cases by temperature obtained during heating: below the boiling point, near the boiling point, and exceeding the boiling point.