Analysis of nonlinear shallow water waves in a tank by concentrated mass model

The sloshing of liquid in a tank is an important engineering problem. For example, liquid storage tanks in industrial facilities can be damaged by earthquakes, and conversely liquid tanks, called tuned liquid damper, are often used as passive mechanical dampers. The water depth is less often than the horizontal length of the tank. In this case, shallow water wave theory can be applied, and the results indicate that the surface waveform in a shallow excited tank exhibits complex behavior caused by nonlinearity and dispersion of the liquid. This study aims to establish a practical analytical model for this phenomenon. A model is proposed that consists of masses, connecting nonlinear springs, connecting dampers, base support dampers, and base support springs. The characteristics of the connecting nonlinear springs are derived from the static and dynamic pressures. The advantages of the proposed model are that nonlinear dispersion is considered and that the problem of non-uniform water depth can be addressed. To confirm the validity of the model, numerical results obtained from the model are compared with theoretical values of the natural frequencies of rectangular and triangular tanks. Numerical results are also compared with experimental results for a rectangular tank. All computational results agree well with the theoretical and experimental results. Therefore, it is concluded that the proposed model is valid for the numerical analysis of nonlinear shallow water wave problems.