The turbulence characteristics of both decelerating and accelerating flows under a gradually varying flume are investigated by using a three-dimensional down-looking acoustic Doppler velocimeter （ADV）. The time-averaged velocity profiles are flatened except for the central parts, and fairly fit into logarithmic laws and those in the plane circulation under the gradual expansion are more likely to be negative. The complex secondary currents are identified under the present gradual transition attributed to the combination of driving forces induced by both the boundary configuration variation and the tmbalanced turbulence： a circulation on each side of the expansion and a pair of circulations on each side of the contraction. One sees an anisotropy in the turbulence intensities, the turbulence intensities increase or level out with the flow depth except those under expansion, and the V component of the turbulence intensity typically outweighs that in the streamwise direction. Apart from the above results, the respective particular distributions of the primary Reynolds shear stresses （ rxy and rxz ） under the gradual expansion and contraction can account for the patterns of the secondary currents in this investigation.
The rapid changes in flow pattern due to varying channel widths will make significantly impact on the hydraulic structures and evolutions of open channel. To better understand the impact of varying width, a flume experiment with adjustable width and a depth-averaged two-dimension numerical model were used to analyze the variations of flow parameters. Our experimental results showed that flow velocity gradually increased with decreasing water depth in converging region, and decreased with increasing water depth in diverging zones. It was also found that the turbulence intensity laws in three directions were not agreed with the theoretical relationships proposed by Nezu and Nakagawa in 1993 in straight open channel flows. The flow in the channel with varying width may change from the supercritical flow to the subcritical flow as a function of Froude number. Our numerical simulations with different flow rates showed that most of the hydraulic jumps in diverging region were submerged jump and the degree of submergence increased with increasing flow rate in gradual channel transition. When the flow rate increased, the range of supercritical flow rapidly decreased and the flow changed from the supercritieal condition to the subcritical condition in diverging sections.
WANG Xie-kangWANG Bing-jieLIU Xing-nianZhang Li-qiong
The evolution of the overland flow velocity along the distance downslope on smooth and granular beds in different cases is investigated by means of the electrolyte tracer via flume experiments. The results demonstrate that a non-uniform flow regime and a uniform flow regime exist in the development process of the overland flow. Owing to the different attributes of beds＇ roughness, the position of those zones with different flow regimes varies correspondingly：（1） the overland flow on granular beds enters into the uniform regime much sooner, additionally, the roll waves tend to appear because of the presence of the proper flow resistance impa-rted by the roughness （coarse sands）, and large slopes （20o and 25o） which makes the flow velocities and depths to undulate spatially. Furthermore, the flow resistance of the overland flows with different roughness elements, that is the non-sands, the fine sands and the coarse sands, is calculated. A quadratic interpolation method of the third order accuracy is employed in the calculation of the longitu-dinal flow resistance. The results show that it is rational to use the bed slope to approximate the hydraulic energy slope over a rela-tive small roughness （the present roughness）, however on the other hand, if the mean flow velocities and depths rather than the local parameters are used to calculate the flow resistance, a considerable error will be induced within the non-uniform regime of the over-land flows, including the acceleration zone and the roll-wave zone.
