Experimental and numerical investigations of primary flow patterns and mixing in laboratory meandering channel

Abstract

Considering fundamental hydraulics, fluid dynamics, and experimental analysis should be analyzed simultaneously with mathematical methods due to the effects of hydraulic properties such as meandering form, sediment, and so on. In this research, to reveal the effects of hydraulic characteristics and longitudinal and transverse coefficients based on the two-dimensional advection-dispersion equation, a laboratory experimental channel has been conducted and analyzed. Additionally, results of experiments have been compared with horizontal two dimensional distributions of flow velocity and concentration fields with respect to the water depth and inlet discharge using two-dimensional depth-averaged numerical models based on FEM (Finite Element Method). SMS and RAMS have been applied with the same experimental conditions and compared. From the analysis of velocity profiles, primary and secondary flows have been visualized. Also the result of pollutant clouds illustrated from the results of tracer tests with an instantaneous and centered injection of solute transport, separation, superposition and stagnation could be deduced outwards of two meandering sections. And same types of characteristics of velocity and pollutant transport could be defined with two-dimensional numerical models.