DOES THE BEDLOAD EQUATION OF MEYER-PETER AND MULLER FIT ITS OWN DATA?

摘要

One of the most famous bedload transport relations in the literature is that of Meyer-Peter and Muellen In the 54 years since its introduction, however, the equation and the data on which it is based do not appear to have been the subject of careful revisitation. Meyer-Peter and Mueller subjected their experimental data obtained at E.T.H. to thorough procedures by which side wall and bedform effects were removed from the boundary shear stress applied by the fluid flowing over the sediment bed before fitting a bedload equation. This bedload equation was developed for an ample range of discharges under normal flow conditions, with uniform materials and sediment mixtures of different values of specific gravity, with and without the presence of bedforms. It is demonstrated here, however, that the procedure for removing bedform effects consistently results in a bedform correction applied to data for which bedforms were not in fact observed. When the bedform correction is abandoned and the sidewall correction is amended to that of Vanoni-Brooks, it is found that the bedload transport relation of Meyer-Peter and Muller overpredicts the E.T.H. and Gilbert data lacking bedforms by a factor of 2.0 to 2.5. An amended version of the relation is presented here for the case of plane-bed conditions.