FACTORS CONTROLLING THE GEOMETRY OF FLUVIAL MEANDERS

The geometry of a meandering stream depends strongly on the relative stream size (Q 2/5 / g 1/5)/D, on the valley slope, Sv, and on the charge, Q s/Q, where Q and Q s are the fluid and sediment discharges respectively, g is acceleration due to gravity and D is the mean sediment size. The geometry depends less strongly on the relative settling size of sediment, D/(v 2/3 / g 1/3), where v is the kinematic viscosity. For constant values of Q, S v and D, the effect of increase of charge reduces the meander length, M L, and the mean channel surface width, B, whereas meander width, M B, bend radius, R M, and mean channel depth, H, increase, For a constant value of (Q 2/5 / g1/5)/D the values of M L, M B, R M and B increase with the increase of valley slope but the value of H tends to decrease.