Erosion and transport of bed-load sediment

In this thesis first a general derivation is given of the 'macro'-equations of mass- and linear-momentum balance that govern the mo'mentum transfer from a Newtonian fluid to rigid particles in a fluid-solid mixture. In particular, attention is paid to a) the attenuation of viscous-momentum transfer from the boundary to the interior of a granular bed subject to a surface flow, b) the drag and lift forces exerted by a turbulent shear flow on particles of the bed surface, and, c) the balance of forces acting on a bed load under uniform-flow conditions. It is shown that filter flow driven by shearing along the boundary of a granular sediment bed exerts a drag force on a layer of only two or three particle diameters within the bed. A drag force on the bulk mass of sediment is only exerted by a pore-pressure gradient. Stability conditions are formulated for a loose granular bed subject to erosive flow, at SHIELDS' grain-movement condition and dUring bed-load transport. 'Macro'-stresses acting along 'wavy' surfaces parallel to the bed are defined for that purpose, and an attenuation factor is introduced for the transmission of turbulent fluid shear from the surface towards the interior of the bed. It is shown that SHIELDS' dimensionless expression for the critical bed shear stress at the threshold of continuous sediment motion, 1/Phi , must reach a constant value for low-shear Reynolds' numbers (Re* < O. 5), as long as there is no cohesion between the particles. It is concluded that the bed load, consisting of particles rolling and saltating over the bed, must reduce the maximum turbulent fluid shear at the bed surface, at sufficiently high bed shear stress, to the critical threshold drag that would lead to the initiation of non-ceasing scour.