Effect of different shapes of bridge piers to minimize local scour

A Scour around bridge supports (pier or abutment) can result in structural collapse and loss of property and life, for that reason there is a necessity to control and decrease the local scour depth. The study of local scour around bridge piers is very important for safe design of piers and foundation of bridges. The experiments were conducted in a 10 meter long, 0.30 meter wide and 0.45 meter deep tilting flume in P.G Hydraulic Laboratory of BVDU College of Engineering, Pune. The flume was operated under the clear water condition using non uniform sand as a bed material. It has been observed that the reduction of maximum depth of scouring is highly dependent on shape of pier, sediment sample (uniform and non-uniform) and flow depth. The experiments were conducted on three different shapes of piers i.e. circular, diamond and elliptical, to investigate the effect of shape on local scour with nonuniform sand bed (Ϭg=1.6, d50=1.18 and Ϭg=2.0, d50=2.36) and flow depth of 14 cm and 16 cm. It was observed that elliptical shape pier has least scour depth than diamond and circular shapes for all operating conditions of experimentation.