Investigation of local scour downstream of parallel sluice gates

Local scour downstream of the hydraulic structures is of great importance. In wide channels, a set of multi gates instead of a single gate may be responsible for transferring water and adjusting upstream water level due to difficulty in gate maneuvering, economic considerations, and ease of movement. Operating parallel sluice gates can create different scenarios owing to clogging or failure in some gates. This study was aimed to assess the effect of different cases of parallel sluice gates operational management, gate opening to channel width ratio, and length of the separator walls on local scour development downstream of parallel sluice gates in different operations. Five operational scenarios were investigated on three parallel sluice gates. The results of the present study showed that the dimensions of the scour hole are a function of the symmetrical and asymmetrical operation of the gates. By reducing the gate opening to channel width ratio, the dimensions of the scour hole increased compared to the classical hydraulic jump mode. Maximum scour depth in the symmetric operational management scenario (B) and the asymmetric scenario (A), increased by 120% and 43%, respectively, compared to the ABC scenario. Increasing the length of the separating walls can be a suitable option to control the dimensions of the scour hole in different operations. Owing to a 20% increase in the length of the separator walls, the maximum scour depth decreased by 68% in the maximum Froude number (8.6) and 122% in the minimum Froude number (4.5) in scenario B. These percentages for scenario A are equal to 17 and 58, respectively. In addition, relations were presented to estimate the dimensions of scour hole in the symmetrical and asymmetrical operation of the parallel gates.