• Semester 1 (Day)
• Semester 1 (External)

Synopsis

In  common with many other areas of engineering, the body of knowledge
within the traditional fluid mechanics areas has expanded widely to  a
point  where  the different disciplines of engineering need  different
specialised  knowledge.  This  is  reflected  in  the  acceptance   of
"hydraulics" or "hydraulic engineering" as a specialist field of study
of prime interest to civil and agricultural engineers. Since water can
largely  be  regarded  as  incompressible,  some  of  the  traditional
concepts of fluid mechanics need to be treated only briefly to  permit
a  greater grounding in the types of problems encountered by hydraulic
engineers.

The  unit  seeks to provide a grounding in fluid statics,  fluid  flow
concepts  and  measurement, steady flow of  incompressible  fluids  in
pipelines, boundary layers on flat plates and in ducts, steady flow in
open  channels, hydraulic models, and an introduction to the  concepts
of  ideal  fluid  flow and curvilinear flow. An introduction  to  some
fundamental  thermodynamic laws and principles  is  also  provided  in
recognition that most engineering systems incorporate energy  transfer
in some form.