Turbulent transition of thermocapillary flow induced by water evaporation

Water has been examined for thermocapillary convection while maintained just outside the mouth of a stainless-steel, conical funnel where it evaporated at different but steady rates. Evaporation at a series of controlled rates was produced by reducing the pressure in the vapor-phase to different but constant values while maintaining the temperature of the water a few millimeters below the interface at 3.56+/-0.03 degrees C in each case. Since water has its maximum density at 4 degrees C, these conditions ensured there would be no buoyancy-driven convection. The measured temperature profile along the liquid-vapor interface was found to be approximately axisymmetric and parabolic with its minimum on the center line and maximum at the periphery. The thermocapillary flow rate was determined in two ways: (1) It was calculated from the interfacial temperature gradient measured along the interface. (2) The deflection of a 12.7-microm-diameter, cantilevered probe inserted into the flow was measured and the liquid velocity required to give that deflection determined. The values determined by the two methods agree reasonably. As the vapor-phase pressure was reduced, the thermocapillary flow rate increased until a limiting value was reached. When the pressure was reduced further, certain of the variable relations underwent a bifurcation and the power spectrum of the probe displacement indicated it was a periodic function with frequency locking. These results suggest that thermocapillary flow plays an important role in the energy transport near the interface of evaporating water. In particular, it appears that the subinterface, uniform-temperature layer, reported in earlier studies, results from the mixing produced by the thermocapillary flow. The Stefan boundary condition is often applied to determine the energy flux to an interface where phase change is occurring; however, when there is strong convective flow parallel to the interface, the normal Stefan condition does not give an adequate description of the energy transport.