scholarly journals Predicting the Flow Velocity at the Toe of a Labyrinth Stepped Spillway

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-25
Author(s):  
Jaafar S. Maatooq

The velocity at the toe of a spillway is a major variable when designing a stilling basin. Reducing this velocity leads to reduce the size of the basin as well as the required appurtenances which needs for dissipating the surplus kinetic energy of the flow. If the spillway chute is able to dissipate more kinetic energy, then the resulting flow velocity at the toe of spillway will be reduced. Typically, stepped spillway is able to dissipate more kinetic energy than that of a smooth surface. In the present study, the typical uniform shape of the steps has been modified to a labyrinth shape. It is postulated that a labyrinth shape can increase the dissipation of kinetic energy through increasing the overlap between the forests of nappe will circulating the flow that in turns leading to further turbulence. This action can reduce the jet velocities near the surfaces, thus minimizing cavitation. At the same time the increasing of circulation regions will maximize the opportunity for air entrainment which also helps to dissipate more kinetic energy. The undertaken physical models were consisted of three labyrinth stepped spillways with magnification ratios (width of labyrinth to width of conventional step) WL/W are 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 as well as testing a conventional stepped spillway (WL/W=1). It is concluded that the spillway chute coefficient is directly proportional to the labyrinth ratio and its value decreases as this ratio increases.

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 4419-4422
Author(s):  
A. S. Kote ◽  
P. B. Nangare

In ogee spillway, the released flood water from crest to toe possesses a high amount of kinetic energy causing scour and erosion on the spillway structure. The dam projects normally have a stilling basin as an energy dissipater which has specific energy dissipation limitations. The stepped spillway is a better option to minimize kinetic energy along the chute and safely discharge water in the river domain. The Khadakwasla dam is situated in Pune, Maharashtra (India), and has scouring and erosion issues on the chute of ogee spillway and on the stilling basin. The present study develops a physical hydraulic model for the dam spillway with steps, plain and slotted roller bucket as per IS Code 6934 (1998) and IS Code 7365 (2010). Experiments were performed at heads of 4m (low head) and 6m (high head) on the developed physical models, namely on the plain and slotted roller bucket model for the ogee spillway and the plain and slotted roller bucket model for the stepped spillway. It was found that the plain roller bucket of ogee spillway dissipates 81.26% of energy at the low head, whereas the stepped spillway with slotted roller bucket dissipates the 83.86% of the energy at the high head.


Author(s):  
Aytaç Güven ◽  
Ahmed Hussein Mahmood

Abstract Spillways are constructed to evacuate the flood discharge safely not to let the flood wave overtop the dam body. There are different types of spillways, ogee type being the conventional one. Stepped spillway is an example of nonconventional spillways. The turbulent flow over stepped spillway was studied numerically by using the Flow-3D package. Different fluid flow characteristics such as longitudinal flow velocity, temperature distribution, density and chemical concentration can be well simulated by Flow-3D. In this study, the influence of slope changes on flow characteristics such as air entrainment, velocity distribution and dynamic pressures distribution over the stepped spillway was modelled by Flow-3D. The results from the numerical model were compared with the experimental study done by others in the literature. Two models of the stepped spillway with different discharge for each model was simulated. The turbulent flow in the experimental model was simulated by the Renormalized Group (RNG) turbulence scheme in the numerical model. A good agreement was achieved between the numerical results and the observed ones, which were exhibited in terms of graphics and statistical tables.


RBRH ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolina Kuhn Novakoski ◽  
◽  
Eliane Conterato ◽  
Marcelo Marques ◽  
Eder Daniel Teixeira ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Stilling basins are structures built at the base of the spillway to dissipate energy, by means of a hydraulic jump. Hydraulic jump is a turbulent phenomenon that causes large pressure fluctuation in the stilling basin bottom, and can damage the sink structure through mechanisms such as fatigue, upflit pressure and cavitation. The use of stepped spillways allows the dissipation of a parcel of the energy while the water falls by the spillway, allowing a reduction in the stilling basin’s dimensions and cost. The present article presents the analysis of the longitudinal distribution of mean pressure, pressure fluctuations, skewness coefficient and kurtosis coefficient, derived from tests on physical hydraulic models. Pressure values measured in a stilling basin downstream of a stepped spillway (for Froude numbers between 5 and 8) were compared with data observed in a stilling basin downstream of a smooth spillway with a radius of concordance between the chute and the basin (for Froude numbers between 4.5 and 10). The results of these studies show that the mean pressures and the pressure fluctuation observed in the stilling basin downstream of stepped spillway present maximum values at the spillway’s closest point, differing, thus, from those at the smooth spillway. The longitudinal distribution of skewness and kurtosis coefficients enabled to define the positions for flow detachment start, roller ending and as well as the ending of the influence of the hydraulic jump over the flow.


2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bentalha Chakib

Stepped spillway is a power full hydraulic structure for energy dissipation because ofthe large value of the surface roughness. The performance of the stepped spillway is enhancedwith the presence of air that can prevent or reduce the cavitation damage. This work aims tosimulate air entrainment and determine the characteristics of flow at stepped spillways. Withinthis work flow over stepped chute is simulated by using fluent computational fluid dynamics(CFD). The volume of fluid (VOF) model is used as a tool to simulate air-water interaction onthe free surface thereby the turbulence closure is derived in the k −ε turbulence standard model.The found numerical results agree well with experimental results.


2019 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-48
Author(s):  
Chakib Bentalha ◽  
Mohammed Habi

Abstract Stepped spillway is hydraulic structure designed to dissipate the excess in kinetic energy at the downstream of dams and can reduce the size of stilling basin at the toe of the spillway or chute. The flow on a stepped spillway is characterised by the large aeration that can prevent or reduce the cavitation damage. The air entrainment starts where the boundary layer attains the free surface of flow; this point is called “point of inception”. Within this work the inception point is determined by using software Ansys Fluent where the volume of fluid (VOF) model is used as a tool to track the free surface thereby the turbulence closure is derived in the k − ε turbulence standard model. This research aims to find new formulas for describe the variation of water depth at step edge and the positions of the inception point, at the same time the contour map of velocity, turbulent kinetic energy and strain rate are presented. The found numerical results agree well with experimental results like the values of computed and measured water depth at the inception point and the numerical and experimental inception point locations. Also, the dimensionless water depth profile obtained by numerical method agrees well with that of measurement. This study confirmed that the Ansys Fluent is a robust software for simulating air entrainment and exploring more characteristics of flow over stepped spillways.


2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 501
Author(s):  
Ali Heidari ◽  
Poria Ghasemi

Stepped spillways are kind of dissipative structures used in rivers with steep slopes to reduce the flow energy and also the scouring potential of water. This dissipation is caused through diffusion along the spillway. The reduction of energy also leads to optimize the still basin geometry and performance downstream, and thus make the project more economic. In this paper, the hydraulic behaviour of stepped spillway is investigated based on kinetic energy. The results show that the average mean kinetic energy decreases upon an appraise in stepss slope. Finally, horizontal steps are proposed. Keywords: Stepped Spillway, Mean Kinetic Energy, Dissipation, and Stepss Slope.


Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 1428
Author(s):  
Awais Raza ◽  
Wuyi Wan ◽  
Kashif Mehmood

Spillway is a crucial hydraulic structure used to discharge excess water from the dam reservoir. Air entrainment is essential to prevent cavitation damage on the spillway, however, without air entrainment the risk of cavitation over the spillway increases. The most important parameter for the determination of air entrainment in stepped spillways is the inception point. The inception point is the location where the air starts to inter into the water flow surface over the spillway. It occurs when the turbulent boundary layer meets the free surface. The location of the inception point depends upon different parameters like flow rate, geometry, step size, and slope of the spillway. The main aim of this study was applying numerical simulation by using the realizable k-ϵ model and the volume of fluid (VOF) method to locate the location of the inception point. For this purpose, by using different stepped spillways with four different slopes (12.5°, 19°, 29°, and 35°) different flow rates were simulated, which gives the location of the inception point of different channel slopes of stepped spillways at different flow rates. The results demonstrated that the inception point location of mild slopes is farther from the crest of the spillway than the steep slope stepped spillway. Non-aerated flow zone length increases when the channel slope decreases from steep to mild slope.


Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 1956 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dong ◽  
Wang ◽  
Vetsch ◽  
Boes ◽  
Tan

Stepped spillways are commonly used under relatively low unit discharge, where cavitation pitting can be avoided by self-aerated flow. However, there are several dams in China with stepped spillways in combination with X-shaped flaring gate piers with unit design discharge considerably larger than specified in the available guidelines. Consequently, air–water two-phase flow on stepped spillway behind X-shaped flaring gate piers under very high unit discharge was investigated using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations. The 3-D Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes equations were solved, including sub-grid models for air entrainment, density evaluation, and drift-flux, to capture self-aerated free-surface flow over the spillway. The pressure on the vertical step faces was compared with laboratory data. In addition, the air–water two-phase flow characteristics and prototype step failure of the simulated prototype spillway were analyzed based on the numerical results of velocity, pressure, and air concentration. Moreover, an optimized bottom-aeration was further studied. The results reveal that the involved models can predict the air concentration near the steps. The cavitation index at the stepped surface is below the threshold value, and the air concentration is insufficient under high unit discharges. Moreover, with the proposed optimization of the aerator air entrainment can be improved and thereby cavitation erosion risk can be reduced.


2017 ◽  
Vol 79 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Very Dermawan ◽  
Djoko Legono ◽  
Denik Sri Krisnayanti

The increase of water quality is related to the presence of dissolved oxygen. Even, the oxygen concentration in surface waters is a main indicator of the water quality for human use as well as for the aquatic biota. Air entrainment on stepped spillway is also recognised for its contribution to the oxygen transfer. The oxygen transfer on stepped spillways in skimming flow regime is increased due to earlier self-aeration and slower flow velocities in comparison to smooth spillways. This paper presents the results gained on a physical model by using a variety of different configurations of stepped spillway. The slopes of stepped spillway (θ) used are 30˚ and 45˚, the number of step (N) are 40 and 20, and two types of steps are flat steps and pooled steps. The experiments were conducted for ten Froude number (Fr) run ranging from 1.117 to 9.909. This research aimed to investigate the influence of different configuration in stepped spillway for predicting of dissolved oxygen. The results showed that the dissolved oxygen of the stepped spillway increases with an increase in chute of slope, number of step, and surface roughness on steps. The increases of Froude number as a function of discharge will cause turbulence flow becomes decreases, and the concentration of air bubble in the water will be decreased. The decreased value of turbulence flow will make dissolved oxygen level decrease. In skimming flow condition, the dissolved oxygen level decreases with increasing discharge per unit width especially for steep bed slope. 


2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (5) ◽  
pp. 523-533
Author(s):  
Zhao Zhou ◽  
Junxing Wang ◽  
David Z. Zhu

Flaring gate piers (FGPs) have been used to increase energy dissipation in stilling basins downstream of spillways. For projects with a low water head and large unit discharge together with a deep tailwater level, energy dissipation inside a conventional stilling basin is usually insufficient. This paper proposes a new partial flaring gate pier (partial FGP) scheme to intensify the energy dissipation inside the stilling basin. The results for the no FGP scheme, the conventional FGP scheme, and the partial FGP scheme were compared using a physical model study and numerical simulations. It was found that the partial FGP scheme (the alternation of flaring and no flaring gate piers in chambers) can contain the submerged hydraulic jump and high-speed water jet in the upstream region of the stilling basin. Thus, the water jet from the FGP chamber was forced to laterally diffuse, thereby intensifying the shear friction and turbulent kinetic energy and forming a vertical vortex from the bottom to the surface. Compared with the other two schemes, the flow pattern in the partial FGP scheme was improved significantly with much deeper air entrainment depth inside the stilling basin and much lower turbulent kinetic energy in the outgoing flow. The mean velocity of the outgoing flow also decreased by more than 20%. The common problems of secondary hydraulic jump outside the stilling basin were eliminated.


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