Course Description: This course is about the movement of water under the force of gravity down slopes and through open (free-surface) channels.  The course begins with a review of concepts typically covered in an undergraduate course on open channel flow in order to ensure that all students are beginning more or less on an equal footing.  Following this we will spend some time on important hydraulic concepts such as shear stress, flow resistance, and the development of velocity profiles, which are fundamental to almost any study of open channel flow hydraulics.  From there we explore the nature of fluid turbulence and work a few of the methods that have been developed for its measurement and visualization.  At this point it is possible to begin the transition from ideal uniform channels, to messy real world channels.  We will look at roughness caused by sedimentary mobile beds and what it does to velocity profiles and turbulence production, and we will explore various non-uniform geometries and discuss their impact on turbulence and shear stress.  We will analyse lab data that we obtain ourselves in the 18 m x 1.2 m x 0.6 m flume at UW using state of the art instrumentation and we will inform ourselves with select studies of hydraulics in open channels.  An introduction to different types of numerical simulation of open channel flows will also be provided. The course is suitable for students that are interested in flow in channels and rivers whether it be for flooding, river engineering, understanding hydraulic habitats of fishes and invertebrates, or understanding transport processes for sediments and pollutants.

Learning Outcomes: By the end of this course, the students are able to:

1. Measure and analyze turbulent velocity profiles in smooth and rough channels;
2. Estimate shear stress on channel boundaries and understand the physical significance of differences between estimates;
3. Measure and characterize turbulence in open channels;
4. Understand the concept of scaling and its role in hydraulics studies;
5. Understand how the complexity of natural channels affects assumptions about uniform flow; and
6. Understand the different approaches to numerical simulation.