Cover stones on liquefiable soil bed under waves

The paper describes the results of an experimental study on the behavior of cover stones on a liquefiable soil bed exposed to a progressive wave. The soil was silt with d₅₀ = 0.098 mm. Stones, the size of 4 cm, were used as cover material. The effect of packing density of stones, and that of number of stone layers (including the effect of an intermediate filter layer) were investigated. Pore pressure was measured across the soil depth. The experiments show that the soil liquefaction depended mainly on two parameters: the packing density of stones, and the number of stone layers. When the liquefaction occurs, stones sink in the soil. Mechanisms of liquefaction and sinking are described, and practical guidelines are recommended.     

Wave boundary layer over a stone-covered bed

This paper summarizes the results of an experimental investigation on wave boundary layers over a bed with large roughness, simulating stone/rock/armour block cover on the sea bottom. The roughness elements used in the experiments were stones the size of 1.4cm and 3.85cm in one group of experiments and regular ping-pong balls the size 3.6cm in the other. The orbital-motion-amplitude-to-roughness ratio at the bed was rather small, in the range a/k_s = 0.6–3. The mean and turbulence properties of the boundary-layer flow were measured. Various configurations of the roughness elements were used in the ping-pong ball experiments to study the influence of packing pattern, packing density, number of layers and surface roughness of the roughness elements. The results show that the friction factor seems to be not extremely sensitive to these factors. The results also show that the friction factor for small values of the parameter a/k_s does not seem to tend to a constant value as a/k_s → 0 (contrary to the suggestion made by some previous investigators). The present friction-factor data indicates that the friction factor constantly increases with decreasing a/k_s. An empirical expression is given for the friction factor for small values of a/k_s. The results further show that the phase lead of the bed friction velocity over the surface elevation does not seem to change radically with a/k_s, and found to be in the range 12°–23°. Furthermore the results show that the boundary-layer turbulence also is not extremely sensitive to the packing pattern, the packing density, the number of layers and the surface roughness of the roughness elements. There exists a steady streaming near the bed in the direction of wave propagation, in agreement with the existing work. The present data indicate that the steady streaming is markedly smaller in the case where the ping-pong balls are aligned at 45° to the wave direction than in the case with 90° alignment. Likewise, it is found that the steady streaming is relatively smaller in the case of the one-layer ping-pong-ball roughness than in the case of the two-layer situation.     

Stability of submerged rock berms exposed to motion of liquefied soil in waves

The paper describes the results of an experimental study on the behaviour of a submerged rock berm in liquefied backfill soil. The soil is liquefied by waves, and the rock berm is subject to the orbital motion of the liquefied soil. The soil used in the experiments was silt with d₅₀=0.075 mm. Various berm materials were used, stones of size 0.74-2.5 cm, plastic balls of size 3.6 cm, brass of size 2.5 cm and steel of size 1.0 cm. The experiments show that rock berms that are stable under very large waves can be unstable when they are exposed to the motion of liquefied soil. The limited data obtained in the study were plotted as a function of the mobility number versus the Keulegan-Carpenter number for the range of the Reynolds number of the tests. The critical mobility number corresponding to the incipient motion of the berm stones is determined. Recommendations are made as to how the present findings can be implemented in practice.     

Flow around a partly buried cylinder in a steady current

The flow around a cylinder, surface mounted or partly buried has been examined at Reynolds number of 1.3×10⁴ and 2.6×10⁴ by using the flow visualization method in the case of steady current. The lengths of the upstream and downstream separation regions were determined and the characteristics of the flow area were discussed for the cylinder having different burial depth to the diameter ratio (G/D). For comparsion, some numerical results obtained from the application of the FLUENT, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software package have also been presented. Both experimental and numerical results indicated that the lengths of the separation regions near the upstream and downstream of the cylinder decreased with the increasing burial ratio (G/D=0, 0.20, 0.50). The results have significant implications both for the illustration of the potential for using CFD software and highlighting the need for data of two dimensional flow around the buried cylinder.     

Oceanic conditions in the eastern equatorial Pacific during the onset of ENSO in the Holocene

Records from South America show that modern ENSO (El Nino-Southern Oscillation) did not exist 7000 cal yr B.P. and has developed progressively since then. There has been little information available on oceanic conditions in the eastern equatorial Pacific (EEP) to constrain explanations for ENSO onset. We report quantitative observations on thermocline and mixed-layer conditions in the EEP during ENSO start up. We found important changes in both the thermocline and the mixed layer, indicating increased upwelling of cooler waters since 7000 cal yr B.P. This resulted from change in the source and/or properties of waters supplying the Equatorial Undercurrent, which feeds upwelling along the equator and the Peru margin. Modeling shows that ENSO is sensitive to subsurface conditions in the eastern equatorial Pacific and that the changes in the thermocline we observed were driven by extratropical processes, giving these a role in conditioning the development of ENSO. This is in contrast to models that call for control of equatorial Pacific oceanography by tropical processes only. These infer stronger upwelling and cooler surface waters for the EEP during the mid-Holocene, which is not supported by our results.