Abstract
A physical model testing method to determine the hydrodynamic force coefficients of an object is proposed and applied to an articulated concrete mattress placed on a flat surface under steady current condition. The test setup, which comprises of a pulley system that is able to pull the concrete mattress in either direction relative to the flow (e.g., with the flow direction or against the flow direction) and one load cell to measure the force required to pull the mattress, is simple and straightforward. Writing the equations of load balance for two different pulling directions allows the force coefficients to be deduced. The novelty and advantages of the method are that it completely removes the difficulties associated with measuring forces on individual concrete blocks and isolating the mattresses from contacting the solid surface, which were common in conventional test methods for measuring hydrodynamic forces on structures founded on a solid surface. A series of flume tests have been conducted to demonstrate the validity of the proposed method. It is expected that the proposed testing method is applicable to a wide range of structures, bed surfaces and flow conditions.
Highlights
Concrete has been the most widely used building material in modern society with justified sustainability [1,2,3]
We focus on a special type of concrete structure, articulated concrete mattresses (ACMs), which are formed by connected concrete blocks through fabric ropes
Considering the lack of systematic research concerning hydrodynamic loads on ACMs and the challenges associated with measuring hydrodynamic forces on ACMs using load cells and full numerical simulation, we propose a new testing method to measure the hydrodynamic force coefficients for ACMs
Summary
Concrete has been the most widely used building material in modern society with justified sustainability [1,2,3]. A similar measuring method with load cells was used by Yamamoto [13] and Hayashi [14] to examine the effect of block geometry on the hydrodynamic force coefficients and the models were isolated from the floor in the experiments. Considering the lack of systematic research concerning hydrodynamic loads on ACMs and the challenges associated with measuring hydrodynamic forces on ACMs using load cells and full numerical simulation, we propose a new testing method to measure the hydrodynamic force coefficients for ACMs. The method allows the determination of total force coefficients without measuring forces on individual concrete blocks, which could be extremely challenging when a large number of blocks are used in a mattress. The new method will complement the methods based on load cells and numerical simulations
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