Suspended Load Transport of Sediment Mixtures

Abstract

Careful experiments were conducted on alluvial beds of four sediment mixtures having different arithmetic mean diameters and standard deviations. The suspended load transport rates of individual fractions were measured and compared with both Einstein's and Holtroff's methods of calculation of suspended load for individual fractions. These methods were found to be unsatisfactory in the present range of sediment parameters. A relationship is found to exist between the dimensionless shear stress and the suspended transport rate for uniform sediment. To make this relation applicable to nonuniform sediments, a corrective multiplying factor for shear stress is introduced. The dimensionless parameters which govern this correction factor are identified and a relation for the same obtained. In this manner the relation can be applied to individual size portions of a sediment mixture.