Experimental study of the non-linear wave interaction with a vertical plate

摘要

Results from experiments on wave interaction with a rigid plate are reported. The plate has a length of 1.2 m and is attached to one of the side-walls of the basin. The side-wall acts as a plane of symmetry, thereby doubling the widths of the plate and of the basin. The instrumentation consists in wave gauges along the weather side of the plate and away in the basin. The tests are carried out in regular waves of varying periods and steepnesses. At wave-lengths comparable with the width of the plate, strong run-ups are observed at the plate-wall intersection, increasing with the wave steepness. These run-ups have a strong transient character and take many wave cycles to develop, with no steady- state being reached in some cases. It is advocated that these phenomena result from third-order interactions between the incident and reflected wave-fields, over a wide area on the weather side of the plate.