AUTOMATED CONTACT ANGLE METER AND AUTOMATIC CONTACT ANGLE MEASURING METHOD

• Main Authors: MICHIKAWA MASANORI, KAMEI SHINICHI
• Format: Patent
• Language: English; Japanese
• Published: 27.10.2014
• Subjects: INVESTIGATING OR ANALYSING MATERIALS BY DETERMINING THEIRCHEMICAL OR PHYSICAL PROPERTIES; MEASURING; PHYSICS; TESTING

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an automated contact angle meter and an automatic contact angle measuring method that realize automatic measurement of a contact angle regardless of properties of a liquid sample and a solid sample.SOLUTION: A controller 60 of an automated contact angle meter 1 comprises: droplet forming and holding means 62 that forms a droplet of a liquid sample at an ejector and causes the ejector to hold it; droplet contact means 63 that uses a movement mechanism to bring a solid sample and the ejector relatively close to each other and brings the droplet into contact with the solid sample; droplet movement determination means 64 that uses the movement mechanism to relatively separate the solid sample and the ejector from each other and determines whether or not the droplet in contact with the solid sample moves away from the ejector and moves to the solid sample; and retry means 65 that, when the droplet movement determination means 64 determines that the droplet does not move to the solid sample, performs retry of using the movement mechanism to bring the solid sample and the ejector relatively close to each other and bringing the droplet into contact with the solid sample again. 【課題】液体試料および固体試料の性状によらず、接触角を自動的に測定可能な自動接触角計および接触角の自動測定方法を提供する。【解決手段】自動接触角計１の制御装置６０は、吐出装置に液体試料の液滴を形成して保持させる液適形成保持手段６２と、移動機構により固体試料および吐出装置を相対的に近接させて固体試料に液滴を接触させる液滴接触手段６３と、移動機構により固体試料および吐出装置を相対的に離隔させて固体試料に接触した液滴が吐出装置から離れて固体試料に移動したか否かを判定する液滴移動判定手段６４と、液滴移動判定手段６４が液滴は固体試料に移動していないと判定した場合に、移動機構により固体試料および吐出装置を相対的に近接させて固体試料に液滴を再度接触させる再試行を行う再試行手段６５と、を備えている。【選択図】図２