An Experimental Study of the Discharge of the Length Increase Effect on the Composite Trapezoidal Labyrinth Spillway

Abstract

Labyrinth weirs are the economic structures to increase the weir output efficiency in limited widths, which can be seen in the plane f trapezoidal and triangular forms. These weirs with a hydraulic load and fixed width pass the more discharge in comparison to other type of weirs. In this study, labyrinth weirs trapezoidal in plane form were investigated. The experiments were performed on 27 laboratory models with 9 different discharge rates and a total of 243 tests. The results showed that, in all of the composite trapezoidal labyrinth weirs, the ratio of discharge coefficient to Ht/p (Ht: Total hydraulic load and p: weir length) weir length was increased at first; after reaching the maximum rate, it started to decrease. According to the suggested general relation, the utmost impact on discharge coefficient resulted from the cycle number and Ht/p relation. Creating new labyrinth on the wing of the weir led to the increase of the effective length; as a result of it, the discharge rate increased in a specific amount of Ht/p. Also, the discharge through a trapezoidal labyrinth weir with the semicircular planform was better than the square; the square, in turn, was better than the simple trapezoidal weirs.

Keywords

• labyrinth weirs
• effective length
• discharge coefficient
• hydraulic load
• composite labyrinth weirs