Numerical simulation of thermal inkjet with bubble growth, droplet ejection and ink refill motion

Numerical simulation is performed for a thermal inkjet process, in which droplet ejection is driven by an evaporating bubble. The liquid-vapor and liquid-air interfaces are tracked by a level set method which is modified to include the effects of phase change and bubble compressibility and is extended to treat the contact angle condition at an immersed solid surface. The whole process of thermal inkjet is simulated without employing a simplified bubble growth model. The present computation demonstrates the inkjet process including jet breaking, satellite droplet formation and ink refill motion as well as bubble growth and collapse.