Application of induction charging to mono-disperse aerosol generator and electric field measurement

Charged droplets passing in an AC electric field vibrate in response to its charge. If only we know the charge of a droplet in advance, we can estimate the field strength from the amplitude of the droplet oscillation at the measuring point because the size is readily calculable from the phase lag of the droplet oscillation. The droplets, which were generated from the vibrating orifice aerosol generator, can be charged by a charging electrode which is set over the orifice. The charge of droplets depends on several parameters like the condition of a liquid jet. The relationship between some of the parameters and charge of droplets has been examined. In this experiment, we applied the method of simultaneous measurements of size and charge of droplets by using laser Doppler system. As an example of electric field measurements, we measured the electric field distribution near the surface of a high-voltage-insulated cable positioned at the center of a metal disk. A reasonable agreement between the measured values and the calculated values was obtained.