Hydraulic Prediction of Near-Field Vibrations Induced by Releasing Flood

摘要

Near-field drastic vibrations caused by flood discharges have a serious impact on nearby residents and can damage buildings. A novel energy dissipator was invented to solve the technical challenge of energy dissipation in the Xiangjiaba Dam project, a giant hydraulic project in China. However, since this project is located near civil buildings, the obvious near-field vibrations at the wake of first-time flood release have become a serious threat for the surrounding residents and need to be solved urgently. Focusing on hydraulic experiments combined with prototype observations, an effective method was proposed to investigate the responsive relationship between discharge floods and vibrations. In the model experiments, 138 cases were carried out under different combinations of discharge and gate-opening modes. During the experiments, fluctuating pressures acting on the structures were measured; 226 cases were tested in the prototype and the corresponding ground acceleration was measured; the relationship between the root-mean square (RMS) of fluctuating pressure and discharge was obtained. Furthermore, based on the prototype observations, the correlation formula between the acceleration of near-field vibrations and discharge was also proposed. Consequently, the study shows that the prediction of acceleration in near-field vibrations is acceptable and the proposed method can be used to study the near-field vibrations induced by flood releases. (C) 2017 American Society of Civil Engineers.