Modelagem de canais abertos unidimensionais pelo método das características

Abstract

The use of numerical modeling for analysis of open channels flow has been discussed by several authors, who has demonstrated in their studies using different methods to solve the problem. In particular, there is the Method of Characteristics, which solves the dominant equations of the system (Saint-Venant’s Equations), and gives good final results. Therefore, it is necessary to compare this method with other ones in the literature, in order to make it more precise, stable and with a lower computational cost involved in its resolution. In this work, the Method of Characteristics was used to study and compare results with an exercise that is contained in the work of Porto (2006). Porto’s work presents its numerical results using the method of finite differences, for a given one-dimensional channel’s flow case. It was also developed a comparison of results between the two methods, with an algorithm that used the Method of the Characteristics to solve the Saint-Venant’s equations. All the results and algorithms are arranged at the end of this work. The algorithm was assembled in Matlab language, but an optional Python language is also attached - both measuring the height and water velocity every 120 seconds in three virtual measurement distinct - initial, intermediate and final stations. In the end, an analysis was made of some peculiarities of the problem, as well as the comparison of the two responses - making visible the precise results of the Characteristic Method, as well as demonstrating the behavior of the channel when afflicted by a triangular diagram wave. It was conclude, however, the effectiveness of this numerical method, in addition to certain peculiarities of solving the problem, together with proposals for future work.