Analysis of Sharp-Crested Rectangular Side Sluice Gates in Sub-Critical Flow Regimes, Based on Spatial Variable Flow Theory and Sluice Gate Discharge Equation

A side sluice gate is an underflow and metering diversion device set into the side of a channel with the purpose of allowing part of the liquid to spill through the side. Review of the literature shows that in spite of the importance of the side sluice gate, little attention has been given to studying the behaviour of flow through this device. The available published works on side sluice gates found are those of Panda (1981), Swamee et al. (1993) and Ghodsian (2003). They related the discharge coefficient of the side sluice gate to depth of flow and gate opening. For this purpose, the side sluice gates, since flow control devices, are widely used in the irrigation channels to divert flow from a main channel to a secondary channel. The main purpose of present study was to determine the water surface profile, gate opening, and flow discharge through the sharp-crested rectangular side sluice gates in a subcritical flow regime in free and submerged flow conditions. This study also provides some approaches to differentiate the free or submerged flow conditions. For this purpose, two approaches of solving spatially varied flow equation in a sub-critical flow regime and the direct solution of the discharge equation of the side sluice gates in determining the flow characteristics of the side sluice gates was experimentally investigated.