Getting one jet to rise just as needed is fairly straight forward. However, start adding more into the mix and you start to wonder why you have inflicted this punishment on yourself. The way that the rising jets attract and repel each other makes for quite the challenge. Apart from getting the spacing of the drops as they hit the surface to be the same you also need to get the correct height and angle correct. As if that is not enough to deal with, once the drops enter the water they create all sorts of turbulence under the surface which also affects the rising jets. Oh, I nearly forgot… to create the tall jets each jet requires 2 drops, equally spaced to enter the water.
I have designed an intricate setup which allows me to release 6 different coloured drops from 6 overhead solenoids and that really helped me in achieving 5 rising jets as well as topping that collision off with centre drop from above.
Without a doubt this was the most difficult type of drop captures I have done.
This compilation of alignment tests for 2 solenoids demonstrates part of the process. I had setup the initial timing and alignment of all six solenoids. My next process is to build the collision by adding one solenoid at a time.
However, when I was doing this I later discovered that I had a problem with the wiring connection to the green solenoid. (This is shown by the number of time you can see I “reset” the green drops to just above the surface and then alter the timings to create a higher jet and a collision).
Once I realise that I was “fighting a losing battle” I had to stop so I could find the fault, which at the time I thought it might have been a partially blocked solenoid. I never did return to have another attempt, but the video is still interesting to see the process