Wickability is the ability of a structured surface to spontaneously absorb liquid due to capillary pressure and transport it through its structure. It is important in the development of passive cooling systems and liquid transport. We determined the ablation threshold fluences of stainless steel, aluminium, and copper for nanosecond laser pulses of wavelength 1060 nm using the D^2 and h methods. Using the same laser system, we systematically fabricated microchannels with different processing parameters and evaluated their wickability by measuring the capillary rise of ethanol and water. We developed a procedure for automated determination of the liquid-front height from recorded images. We achieved capillary-rise results comparable to or better than those we found in the literature.
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