New, Passive Technique for the In situ Measurement of Total Suspended SolidsConcentrations in Surface Water

摘要

The use of pressure transducers to measure total suspended solids concentrationsand particle sizes is demonstrated. It is shown that either differential or gauge pressure transducers can be used in conjunction with automated data acquisition systems to accurately and continuously record sediment data. The new techniques rely on the ability of pressure transducers to monitor changes in the specific weight of sediment-bearing water. Stokes' Law is used to infer the effective particle diameter of glass beads with known particle diameters. Deficiencies between inferred and known diameters are attributed to violation of Stokes' assumptions. Field deployment of total suspended solids measurement devices are proposed based upon laboratory prototypes.