Full-automatic Dynamic & Static Optical Contact Angle Meter / Interface Tensiometer

What’s Contact Angle?

Contact angle,θ, is defined as the angle between tangent of gas-liquid interface and that of solid-liquid interface formed at the three phases’ boundary where liquid, vapor and solid intersect.

Fields of Application

International norms and standards

→　ASTM D 724: Standard Test Method for Surface Wettability of Paper (Angle-of-Contact Method)

→　ASTM D 5946-2004: Standard Test Method for Corona-Treated Polymer Films Using Water Contact Angle Measurements

→　 ISO 15989: Plastics- Film and sheeting - Measurement of water - contact angle of corona-treated films

 USA KINO makes comprehensive analysis of both merit and demerit of various optical contact angle meters around the world. And SL200C series are our update products in terms of long-term experience in R&D and on-site production. For the purpose of cost control and performance improvement, comprehensive optimization has been made in mechanism and optical system; Software design to maintain movement of sample stage and lens stability and to provide high definition and performance images.

More powerful mechanical control system

1. 6-axis mechanical movement controlled by software with higher control accuracy and more stable.

2. Patented rotary table of software control: lens rotate with sample stage with precision of up to 0.001 degree; measuring roll off angle-stable, convenient and accurate.

3. Software-controlled syringe pump with replaceable needle, control accuracy: 0.001mm; picoliter, nanolitre with micro-voltage dosing system for option;

4. Stable dosing process; stable control process for measuring dynamic contact angle by expanding / contraction method.

5. Flexible focus control system and micro distance of needles moving controlled by motor (about 0.01mm) makes more accurate and easier operation of transferring drop, especially for super-hydrophobic biomimetic material surface test.

More accurate, stable and diversified control system

1. Precision positioning stage, linear guide, screw technology used in hardware control system, with precision up to 0.01mm by manual and 0.5μm by software control respectively.

2. Uniquely-designed mechanism of up to 10 axis control (6-axis linear adjustments +1 rotation adjustment +3 horizontal adjustments), coordinate the operation of sample stage, lens, camera, dosing system and vision system.

3. Zero-backlash and low error on-axis optical positioning guarantees stability, repeatability and exceptionally smooth motion.

4. Integrate designed instrument with mainframe made of high-grade aviation aluminum guarantees its portable and fastness.

More professional and comfortable design of mechanism

1. Unique mechanism of fixed focal distance and high-precision adjustable positioning stage, with easier and more accurate focal distance obtain and clearer image capture.

2. Integral rotation system controlled by rotation positioning stage, enabling sample stage to rotate with lens in order to hold drop image in field of view during capture process.

The unique design makes accurate analysis of roll off contact angle possible without hard operation and bad precision when rolling the entire instrument, as well as avoiding drop disappearing from the vision when partially rotating. Besides, just a simple switch can enable sample stage rotating only. (Manual and electronic tilting base for option).

3. Soft light plate made of frosted quartz glass achieves clearer, sharper and softer background light and better imaging contour profile shape effect.

4. Unique design of the syringe replaceable direct dosing system makes it easy to hold KINO’s OEM syringe or special syringe with PTFE needle, ultra-thin needle (OD:0.23mm) for measuring hydrophobic material and syringe measuring medium / high viscosity sample.

5. System with four level adjustment units: Except one complete machine level adjustment via quadrupled tuning knob and one precision tilting adjustment of lens and camera via 1 axis tilt platform stage with micrometer, we provide one multi-axis tilt platform to adjust the level of sample and one zero-backlash rotation stage to roll the sample stage in addition. All these guarantee the accuracy of base line detection and the measurement of roll-off contact angle.

6. Adjustment both by hardware and software with better base line detection.

The level adjusting mechanism, illumination-adjustable LED cold light source as well as CAST®3.0 software system provide you strong assurance of better base lines detection, and more convenient measurement of roll-off contact angle and advancing/receding contact angle.

6. Optional with GigE or CameraLink cameras for faster data transmission and better stability.

Interfacial chemical analytical system (ADSA^TM) CAST 3.0 with more functionalities and more comfortable user interface

1. Six drop shape states for analysis:

Sessile drop (liquid/gas, liquid/liquid/gas), pendant drop, captive drop, tilted plate and oscillated drop

2. Seven methods to calculate contact angle and nearly 20 kinds of curve-fitting technologies:

(1) Exclusive methods of θ/2, circle fitting, ellipse fitting, RealDrop^TM, spline curve-fitting, Young-Laplace equation fitting, curve ruler (tangent method);

(2) Dynamic / static contact angle measurement

(3) 20 exclusive curve ruler methods, such as circle, spline, Gaussian and Power, enable you to analyze:

-Advancing / receding contact angle

-Irregular angle

3. Twelve surface free energy calculating models, providing you more options to estimate surface free energy and its distributions.

Exclusively provided 12 methods for estimating surface free energy, e.g. Equation of State (Neumann et al.), Good-Girifalco, Owen-Wendt-Rabel, Simple Fowkes, Extended Fowkes, WU method 1-2, Schultz method 1-2, Acid-base (Van OSS & Good), Jhu, and Zizman Plot (critical surface tension) method, can be used to measure surface free energy and its distribution (dispersive force, polar force and hydrogen bond value, and Lewis acid-base, etc.) of low / high energy solid surface.

4. 300 kinds of liquids with 800 data values of liquid surface tension and its contributions as reference data or for faster analysis of surface free energy of solid.

5. Unique interfacial tensiometer of liquid-gas / liquid-liquid with Young-Laplace equation fitting method based on Bashford-Adams table and Realdrop^TM, used for oscillating drop tests, surface tension measurement of medium to high viscosity sample, dynamic surface / interface tension measurement of surfactant, and oscillating & expanding drop measurement (corresponding modules are required).

6. Unique curve base line correction technology for measurement of contact angle of lower / upper convex.

Exclusive curve base line based circle-fitting or curve-fitting of unilateral arbitrary curve shapes with easier operation and more accurate result.

7. Rod, thread and tilted plate method based interface tension and contact angle measurement for analysis of contact angle of single fiber. (Need to choose and buy related accessories)

8. Dual-software triggering technology for analysis of complicated dynamic / static contact angle.

Unique dual-software triggering technology of CAST®3.0 can not only be applied to measure static contact angle but also advancing / receding contact angle, roll off angle, time-dependent (standard speed is 25 FPS, and camera with higher speed are optional) contact angle and zero-time contact angle of ultra-water absorption material (e.g. powder, fiber, paper, and artificial periosteum). It is applied more extensively with better measured result.

9. Unique technology of wetting behavior analysis (WBA / wetting envelopes).

A 2D map of wetting envelope can be constructed by using the components of surface free energy and corresponding method (such as OWEN), and a plot produces to show how wettability occurs. It is another way of understanding contact angle, hence degree of wetting, arise from an understanding of the forces existing in the material and between the materials.

Wetting behavior analysis of low-energy solid material

10. More comfortable software user interface

(1) New-generation wizard UI. Our software will implement measuring contact angle, surface free energy automatically at the touch of a finger according to wizard UI. Besides, with our 140-page user manual, you can operate the instrument easily without any professional training.

(2) Unicode based software interface. Its English user interface can easily be changed to other language (such as Simplified-Chinese), and makes it more convenient to operate.

11. Fully automatic analysis of contact angle, adhesive work and surface free energy

(1) Fully automatic. Just press ”Measure”, images capture, contact angle calculation, data storage and real-time display measured value will be done without manual intervention.

(2) Manual modification function. Double-click ”Modify”, you can modify measured values by captured image, and software saves the record of operation traces conveniently to avoid errors of automatic measured value.

(3) Real-time graph. Left / right contact angle, average contact angle, adhesive work, surface free energy used equation of state method can be real-time displayed without extra calculation.

12. Powerful database management for convenient storage, query, and exporting data:

√Access database technology provides you more powerful functions

√ Real-time saving and indexing of measured values

√One-to-one correspondence between measured data and image; corresponding drop image is automatically displayed when the data is selected

√ Historical data query

√ Modification of historical data

√ Importing and backup of historical data

√ Database compression

13. Measured data exportable.

All measured data can be exported into Excel file and image file into BMP file, which can be easily imported into scientific article and testing report.

14. Standardized windows technology based video capture technology with better compatibility.

The standardized design of video capture method with the windows multimedia technology enables compatibility of various contact angle meters around the world. Just enjoy the convenience brought by CAST®3.0.

15. Unique video recording function. Measurement process can be recorded into AVI format for later use.

  Technical Specification

“*” marks the major differences between different models.

Accessories

1. Environmental chamber

→ Temperature sample chamber

(1) Solid sample temperature control,

(2) Temperature control of test liquid;

(1) and (2) are two temperature control systems for controlling temperature of liquid sample and solid sample respectively. Clients can purchase either or both of them.

→ The following environmental chambers for solid samples are optional:

(1) Sample chamber

- Connect to water circulators to control temperature of sample

- Temperature range: -40-150℃,

- Resolution: 0.01℃℃

(2) Peltier semiconductor heating and refrigerating chamber: Temperature range:5-85℃, resolution: 0.5℃;

(3) Special temperature heating chamber:

Any special requirements for temperature control, such as 200℃ and 400℃, please contact us for confirmation.

It is recommended to use water circulator for liquid temperature control.

→ Contact angle measurement in high-temperature of 1400℃, 1700℃, 1800℃, and 2000℃ can be realized; a down payment is required for customisation.

→ Contact angle measurement in vacuum environment or different gas envronments can be realized; a down payment is required for customisation.

→ Sample chamber: Sample can be kept completely stable and free from effect of temperature and light dazzling; a down payment is required for customisation.

→ Sample chamber for measurement of high-temperature interface tension:

Method of pendent drop or sessile drop is used for measuring interface tension between melted solid materials and air; a down payment is required for customisation.

2. Full set of syringes and needles.

→ Full set of high-precision micro syringes: 25μL, 100μL, 500μL, and 1000μL, etc.

→ Full set of needles: PTFE, stainless steel (various OD such as 2mm, 1mm, 0.5mm,0.3mm, 0.23mm,etc. ), plastic, and curved needles for captive drop method etc.

3. Software-controlled dual-channel syringe pump of high-precision

4. Special sample holders for holding fiber, film and paper etc.

5. Sample vessel made of quartz glass for captive drop method and pendant drop in interface tension measurement.

6. Module of oscillating drop method (interface rheology ODM/EDM)

(1) The leading-edge high-frequency oscillator and oscillation control system designed by USA KINO enable higher control precision and more flexible control mode. Oscillator with different oscillation frequencies and amplitudes is available at your option.

(2) Optional sample dosing syringe: 0.5μL, 1μL, 5μL, 15μL, 100μL, 500μL and 1,000μL etc.

(3) The Oscillation waveforms cover sine wave, cosine wave, triangular wave, linear wave and saw tooth wave without attenuation or distortion when below 2K Hz.

 Special Statements

1.The above production pictures and technical specifications are subject to change without notice; and the latest confirmed product information shall prevail.　

2. All rights reserved by USA Kino Industry Co. Ltd.