HydroCAD® Stormwater Modeling - Since 1986
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Sample Pond #1The following photos illustrate an earth-berm detention pond in a residential subdivision. The outlet device is a riser constructed of corrugated metal pipe, topped with a trash rack and anti-vortex plate. Side openings in the riser handle low-flow conditions, and serve to empty the pond after each storm.
To model this pond: First define the stage-storage curve. This is readily done by entering the area of the pond at each contour elevation, from the bottom of the pond up to the top of the berm. For this size pond, areas are most easily entered in square-feet, rather than acres. Since all sides of the pond are sloped, volumes are most accurately determined by conic sections, and you should specify entry by "Conic Area."
The next outlets we encounter are the perforations in the side of the riser. These are placed in several rings around the riser. Rather than modeling each hole as a separate orifice (which would require an excessive number of devices) we can define one device for each ring, and use the discharge multiplier to specify the number of openings at that elevation. If there were three rings of side opening, we would need three device definitions.
Continuing to number in sequence, these would be devices 2, 3, and 4. Since
each of these devices flows through the culvert barrel (rather than discharging directly
out of the pond) each one must be routed through the barrel. This is done
by setting the routing to device number "1", which is the culvert barrel
in this example. Finally we encounter the top of the riser. Under low-head conditions this will behave as a sharp-crested weir, but as the head increases it will transition to orifice flow. This is easily modeled using a horizontal orifice and selecting the option to "Use weir equation at low heads." (Prior to HydroCAD-5 you must explicitly set up the orifice and a weir routed in series.) When configuring the horizontal orifice, note that it must be routed through device number 1, the horizontal culvert barrel. This is critical in order to allow for possible control by either device, and to avoid adding the flow from both devices! After entering all the devices, the Outlets screen will look similar to the example below. When reading this table, it is essential to distinguish between the device number (which appears in the # column) and the device routing! In this example, we would read:
Device number 1 is a culvert, which is routed to the primary
discharge.
The pond summary report includes a graphical representation of the device configuration, as shown in the right-hand illustration above. Note that device 1 (the culvert barrel) is the only device routed directly to the primary discharge. All other devices are combined and then routed through device 1. This allows for the possibility that the culvert barrel may control under certain conditions.
Depending on the specific design, you may also be able to observe points of inflection where the top of the riser transitions from weir flow to orifice flow, or where the culvert barrel begins to control. What if I have another outlet structure on the same pond?
Note the additional of a new culvert outlet as device #6. In this case we have elected to route this culvert to the secondary outflow, in order to provide for separate routing and reporting. Then we define each of the riser inlets, exactly as we did before, but this time each of the inlets is routed to Device 6, which is the new culvert. Your device routing will varying, depending on the actual position of the culvert and it's corresponding device number. Once again, check your work by examining the stage-discharge curve, and the device routing as shown on the pond summary.
Also see sample pond #3 which employs a concrete riser structure, and sample pond #2 which illustrates a larger flood-control pond. |
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