We present an experimental study of a low-Reynolds number shear flow between two surfaces, one of which has a regular grooved texture augmented with a superhydrophobic coating. The combination reduces the effective fluid-surface contact area, thereby appreciably decreasing the drag on the surface and effectively changing the macroscopic boundary condition on the surface from no slip to limited slip. We measure the force on the surface and the velocity field in the immediate vicinity on the surface (and thus the wall shear) simultaneously. The latter facilitates a direct assessment of the effective slip length associated with the drag reduction.

We study fluid flow in the vicinity of textured and superhydrophobically coated surfaces with characteristic texture sizes on the order of 10μm. Both for droplets moving down an inclined surface and for an external flow near the surface (hydrofoil), there is evidence of appreciable drag reduction in the presence of surface texture combined with superhydrophobic coating. On textured inclined surfaces, the drops roll faster than on a coated untextured surface at the same angle. The highest drop velocities are achieved on surfaces with irregular textures with characteristic feature size ∼8μm. Application of the same texture and coating to the surface of a hydrofoil in a water tunnel results in drag reduction on the order of 10% or higher. This behavior is explained by the reduction of the contact area between the surface and the fluid, which can be interpreted in terms of changing the macroscopic boundary condition to allow nonzero slip velocity.

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