Minimum wall pressure coefficient of orifice plate energy dissipater

Orifice plate energy dissipaters have been successfully used in large-scale hydropower projects due to their simple structure, convenient construction procedure, and high energy dissipation ratio. The minimum wall pressure coefficient of an orifice plate can indirectly reflect its cavitation characteristics： the lower the minimum wall pressure coefficient is, the better the ability of the orifice plate to resist cavitation damage is. Thus, it is important to study the minimum wall pressure coefficient of the orifice plate. In this study, this coefficient and related parameters, such as the contraction ratio, defined as the ratio of the orifice plate diameter to the flood-discharging tunnel diameter; the relative thickness, defined as the ratio of the orifice plate thickness to the tunnel diameter; and the Reynolds number of the flow through the orifice plate, were theoretically analyzed, and their relationships were obtained through physical model experiments. It can be concluded that the minimum wall pressure coefficient is mainly dominated by the contraction ratio and relative thickness. The lower the contraction ratio and relative thickness are, the larger the minimum wall pressure coefficient is. The effects of the Reynolds number on the minimum wall pressure coefficient can be neglected when it is larger than 10^5. An emoirical expression was presented to calculate the minimum wall oressure coefficient in this study.

FLOWS THROUGH ENERGY DISSIPATERS WITH SUDDEN REDUCTION AND SUDDEN ENLARGEMENT FORMS

The energy dissipation of flood discharges has been one of important problems that affect directly the safety of hydropower projects. The energy dissipater with sudden reduction and sudden enlargement forms, used widely in large-scale projects has been a kind of effective structure for energy dissipation. The concept of critical thickness was defined, which is related to both the geometric parameters and the hydraulic parameters of the energy dissipater, and the factors affecting the critical thickness, were analzsed by means of dimensional analysis. The empirical expression about the critical thickness was obtained and could be used as the criterion to distinguish the flows through the energy dissipater, i.e., the plug flow and the orifice plate flow. The error analysis showed that the critical thickness calculated by the expression has the errors of smaller than 10% in the estimation of the flows for the energy dissipater mentioned above.

HYDRAULIC CHARACTERISTICS OF PLUG ENERGY DISSIPATER IN FLOOD DISCHARGE TUNNEL

The hydraulic characteristics of three types of plugs, namely, the single plug, the stepped plug and the gradually contracted plug were studied by means of experimental and numerical simulations. Main research findings are as follows. For the single plug, the pressure recovery lengths inside and after the plug range from 0.63-1.05 times and 2.02-2.84 times of the tunnel diameter, respectively. For the stepped plug, the lengths are 0.24-0.32 times and 1.62-2.84 times of the tunnel diameter, respectively. The best ratio of the inlet diameter to the outlet diameter of the gradually contracted plug can be expressed by a linear function. The relationship between the head loss coefficient and the area contraction ratio is obtained. The incipient cavitation numbers of different plugs are experimentally and numerically determined, and the incipient cavitation numbers are expressed by a formula. Model experiment with scale of 1：50 was carried out on a pressure tunnel with three-stage gradually contracted plugs. The results show that this type of energy dissipater is suitable for spill tunnels of high head （nearly 200 m） and large flow rate （nearly 2500 m^3/s）.

Flow choking characteristics of slit-type energy dissipaters

In this paper, the behavior of the flow choking, including the critical and developing states, was experimentally investiga- ted by means of five slit-type outlets, characterized by the outlet width, the contraction angle and the opening of the working gate. The results showed that the approach flow Froude number of the critical choking decreases if the outlet width increases, or the con- traction angle decreases, or the opening increases. There is the hysteresis when the flow choking develops, i.e., the Froude numbers of the appearance and disappearance of the flow choking at the increasing discharge regime are all larger than those at the decreasing discharge regime. For various widths of the outlets, the differences between the critical Froude numbers at small opening are much larger than thoset at large opening. The change range from appearance to disappearance of the flow choking at small opening is smaller than that at large opening.

Local scour by multiple slit-type energy dissipaters

Energy dissipation and scour control are all the key issues for the design of hydraulic structures.On the basis of the high energy dissipation for the multiple slit-type energy dissipaters(M-STED)developed by the authors,in this work,the characteristics of the scour hole for the M-STED were experimentally investigated through three sets of those physical models with five cases and a scour hole form index was proposed.The results show that,the M-STED results in not only the high energy dissipation but also the mild upstream slope of the scour hole thanks to the scour hole form index of larger than 0.5,which is in favor of the safety of the release works.

Shock waves and water wing in slit-type energy dissipaters

The slit-type energy dissipater（STED）is widely used in hydraulic projects of high water head,large discharge,and narrow river valley,thanks to its simple structure and high efficiency.However,the water wing caused by the shock waves in the contraction section of the STED may bring about harmful effects.A coefficient is introduced for the application of Ippen？s theory in the STED.The expression of the coefficient is experimentally obtained.Simplified formulas to calculate the shock wave angle and the water wing scope are theoretically derived,with relative errors within 5%.

HYDRAULIC CHARACTERISTICS OF SLIT-TYPE ENERGY DISSIPA-TERS

Slit-Type Energy Dissipater （STED） has been a kind of important devices for energy dissipation. The flow through the STED is longitudinally extended and the velocity is decreased by means of the cross-section increase of the flow, which is closely related to geometric and hydraulic parameters of the STED. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate and control the hydraulic condi- tions through the STED, including the nappe section form, the conversion condition, and the effect of energy dissipation with the geometric and hydraulic parameters. In the present work, ＂I-type＂ and ＂T-type＂ nappe forms were experimentally classified, the con- version conditions of the nappe forms were empirically provided, and the effects of geometric parameters of the STED on energy dissipation were roughly analyzed. It is concluded that the contraction angle of the STED is a key factor influencing the hydraulic characteristics of the STED.

ABRUPT DEFLECTED SUPERCRITICAL WATER FLOW-REVISED THEORY OF SHOCK WAVE

The shock wave angle and depth ratio of the abrupt deflected supercritical water flow due to deflector was investigated experimentally and theoretically. A correction coefficient of the hydro-dynamic pressure ξ was introduced to generalize the momentum equation in the perpendicular direction to the shock front. An extensive series of tests were conducted in a 1 m wide flume with the Froude number ranging from 1.70 to 8.37, the deflection angle ranging from 5° to 40° and the length of deflector ranging from 0.28 m to 1 m. A dimensionless parameter K was defined to depict the ratio of the flow height to flow thickness. Test results show that the val ue of ~, the correction coefficient of the non-hydrostatic pres- sure distribution, decreases with the increase of the value of K An empirical relationship between the value of ξ and the val ue of K was proposed. It is indicated that the relative errors of the results calculated by the revised theory is much smaller than that obtained from the Ippen theory. Finally, a simple explicit expression was suggested to calculate the shock wave height ratio in consideration of the effect of the non-hydrostatic pressure distribution.

Hydraulic jump basins with wedge-shaped baffles

This laboratory study deals with the hydraulic jump properties for an artificially roughened bed with wedge-shaped baffle blocks. The experiments were conducted for both smooth and rough beds with a Froude number in the range of 3.06≤F1≤10.95 and a relative bed roughness ranging 0.22≤KR≤1.4. The data from this study were compared with those of rectangular baffle blocks. New experimental formulae were developed for determining the sequent depth ratio and the hydraulic jump length in terms of the inflow Froude number and relative bed roughness. Bélanger's jump equation of a rectangular channel was extended to account for the implications of the bed shear stress coefficient attributable to channel bed roughness. It was found that, in comparison with the smooth bed, the wedge-shaped bed roughness reduced the sequent depth of the hydraulic jump by approximately 16.5% to 30% and the hydraulic jump length by approximately 30% to 53%.

Hydraulic Characteristics of Multi-Stage Orifice Plate

Energy dissipater of multi-stage orifice plate, as a kind of effective energy dissipater with characteristics of high energy dissipation ratio and low cavitations risk, has become welcomed more and more by hydraulics researchers. The relationship between the contraction ratio of upper stage orifice plate and the lower one's under the principle of equal-cavitation characteristics, and the reasonable distance between upper stage orifice plate and the lower one under the condition of complying with this principle, are two important factors to be considered for multi-stage energy dissipater design. In the present paper, these two factors were analyzed by theoretical consideration and numerical simulations, and solving methods were put forward. The conclusion in this paper was proved to be reasonable by model experiment.

REDUCTION OF STILLING BASIN LENGTH WITH TALL END SILL

Experiments were conducted to characterize forced hydraulic jumps in stilling basins for enforced cases due to tail water level or dam site arrangement and construction. The case with a single tall sill was simulated in a horizontal flume downstream of a sluice gate. Results of experiments are compared with the classical hydraulic jump, and significant effect of tall sill on dissipation of energy in shorter distance was confirmed. Furthermore, the generated jumps were classified based on the ratio of sill height to basin length, and a simple design criterion was proposed to estimate the basin length for a desired jump and particular inflow.