Record Details
Hydraulic control of grain size distributions and differential transport rates of bedload gravels Oak Creek, Oregon
ScholarsArchive at Oregon State University
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Title | Hydraulic control of grain size distributions and differential transport rates of bedload gravels Oak Creek, Oregon |
| Names |
Shih, Shyuer-ming
(creator) Komar, Paul D. (advisor) |
| Date Issued | 1989-07-19 (iso8601) |
| Note | Graduation date: 1990 |
| Abstract | Grain-size distributions of gravels transported as bedload in Oak Creek, Oregon, show systematic variations with changing flow discharges. At low discharges the gravel distributions are nearly symmetrical and Gaussian. As discharges increase, the distributions become more skewed and follow the ideal Rosin distribution. The patterns of variations are established by goodness-of-fit comparisons between the measured and theoretical distributions, and by Q-mode factor analysis. Two end members are obtained in the factor analysis, respectively having almost perfect Gaussian and Rosin distributions, and the percentages of the two end members within individual samples vary systematically with discharge. Transformation from the Gaussian to a Rosin distribution with increasing discharge may be explained by processes of selective entrainment of grains from a bed of mixed sizes. Samples of bed material in Oak Creek follow the Rosin distribution. At high discharges, the transported bedload approaches the grain sizes of that bed-material source and mimics its Rosin distribution. Random-selection processes must be more important to grain entrainment at lower discharges, so that the resulting Gaussian distributions of transported bedload reflect similar distributions of bed stresses exerted by the stream flow. The results from Oak Creek demonstrate that the competence of the flow is reflected in the entire distribution of transported gravel sizes. A sequence of layers of fluvial gravels, modern or ancient, might show systematic variations between coarse Rosin and finer-grained Gaussian distributions, and these could be used to infer frequencies of various discharges and to establish a relationship to the source sediment. A differential bedload transport function is formulated utilizing the dependence of two parameters in the Rosin distribution on the flow stress. The total transport rate, which is also a function of the flow stress, is apportioned within the Rosin grain-size distribution to yield the fractional transport rates. The derived bedload function has the advantage of yielding smooth, continuous frequency distributions of transport rates for the grain-size fractions, in contrast to the discrete transport functions which predict rates for specified sieve fractions. A group of differential transport frequency curves can be constructed that reflects a particular stream's bedload transport characteristics. Successful reproduction of the measured fractional transport rates and bedload grainsize distributions by this approach demonstrates its potential in flow-competence estimates, evaluations of differential transport rates of size fractions, and in investigations of downstream changes in bed material grain-size distributions. |
| Genre | Thesis/Dissertation |
| Topic | Bed load -- Oregon -- Oak Creek -- Measurement |
| Identifier | http://hdl.handle.net/1957/23592 |
