The Dust Bowl experienced by the United States during 1930’s saw the establishment of the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) on April 27, 1935. The SCS was established as a permanent agency the US Department of Agriculture with a mission to conserve the nation’s soil and water resources.
With this mandate, researchers at the SCS began the investigation and development of a class of flumes suitable for use in measuring agricultural flows. The H Flume, so called because it was the eighth in a series of flumes investigated, combined the flow sensitivity of a narrow angle V-notch weir with the flat floor and self-cleaning properties of a flume.
The H series of flumes are more modified weirs than they are true flumes – with a V-shaped throat and no diverging / discharge section. The H Flume design allows a wider range of flows than any other flume type – providing low flow sensitivity as well as the ability to measure high flow rates. Applications such as edge-of-field runoff monitoring that have low average flows and substantially higher rain even flows are idea candidates for H Flumes.
The flat floor of the H Flumes means that it passes sediments and smaller debris fairly easily. However, smaller HS / H Flumes are generally not recommended for use on flows containing sanitary solids or larger debris as these can lodge in the narrow discharge of the flume.
H Flume Materials
Openchannelflow manufactures H Flumes in a number of different materials:
Aluminum H Flumes are commonly used for remote applications where the flume must be lightweight and rugged but where cost is not as the driving decision factor. Fiberglass is used to measure edge-of-field and industrial discharges. Galvanized steel is a lower cost material used when measuring surface water runoffs. Finally, stainless steel is used when material durability and resistance to corrosion and abrasion are paramount.
H Flume Accessories
Over the years Openchannelflow has developed a series of accessories to help our customers tailor their H Flumes to their specific needs, including:
- Standard and custom approach sections
- Piping / end connections
- Flow condition options
- Flow meter mounts
- Sampler / parameter mounts
H Flume Applications
While originally developed for agricultural runoff monitoring, the versatility of the H Flume has seen it used in a number of different applications:
- Edge-of-Field Monitoring
- Watershed Monitoring
- Dam Seepage
- Industrial Discharge Monitoring
- Sewage Treatment Plants (screened / treated flows)
- Spring Discharge Measurement