Flow choking characteristics of slit-type energy dissipaters

In this paper, the behavior of the flow choking, including the critical and developing states, was experimentally investigated by means of five slit-type outlets, characterized by the outlet width, the contraction angle and the opening of the working gate. The results showed that the approach flow Froude number of the critical choking decreases if the outlet width increases, or the contraction angle decreases, or the opening increases. There is the hysteresis when the flow choking develops, i.e., the Froude numbers of the appearance and disappearance of the flow choking at the increasing discharge regime are all larger than those at the decreasing discharge regime. For various widths of the outlets, the differences between the critical Froude numbers at small opening are much larger than thoset at large opening. The change range from appearance to disappearance of the flow choking at small opening is smaller than that at large opening.