Ashley T. Howes, Ph.D. | Overview | Projects | PhD Research | My Blog | Contact |
Plunge Pools form at the base of falling water structures either by design (e.g. a fountain falling into a surrounding pool) or naturally (e.g. by the erosive power of a waterfall). One of the key observations of plunge pools is that their turbulent nature is generated not just by the section of falling water, but also interactions happening inside the pool volume and the surface state at the time of impact.
We attempted to model the surface of the turbulent plunge pool using a flexible polygonal mesh, instructed to interact with its neighbours in a manner which was observed from nature. Careful consideration was also given to the underlying bottom of the plunge pool and what affect it had on surface properties.
When a water drop strikes the surface of a plunge pool it creates ripples which move across the surface. These ripples interact with other ripples as well as surface obstacles, and are affected by global behaviour inside the water volume (e.g. a direction of flow). All these behaviours were modelled including the release of mist from a water volume when the turbulent interaction exceeds a calculated threshold.
Examples
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A sample ripple moving across the surface |
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Intersecting ripples |
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Intersecting ripples within a bounded volume |
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Mist rising from a turbulent plunge pool |