Dimensionless critical shear stress for sediment particles under varying slope conditions

Abstract

One of the most fundamental and practical issues in sedimentology is making predictions on initial sediment motion. Many widely used bedload sediment-transport models are based on the concept that sediment transport either begins at or can be scaled by, a constant value of the dimensionless critical shear stress. Flume experiments were conducted for three different diameters of spherical particles under varying channel slope. A model is presented to determine the dimensionless critical shear stress for the incipient motion of spherical particles on nonhorizontal slopes. The findings of the study have been illustrated with mathematical relationships and graphical representations for various combinations of input variables.