Effects of the bottom slope and guiding wall length on the performance of a vortex drop inlet

Laboratory experiments were conducted to assess the performance of a vortex drop inlet with a spiral intake in subcritical and supercritical flow conditions. The water surface elevation at multiple locations was measured for different flowrates by varying the extent of the guiding wall and the longitudinal and radial bottom slopes. The measurements show that a steeper longitudinal bottom slope decreases the water surface elevation at the beginning of the intake, resulting in a transcritical flow in the intake structure. However, a steeper longitudinal bottom slope also causes the maximum water surface elevation to occur within the spiral intake. For an effective vortex drop inlet design, achieving a low water surface elevation throughout the entire spiral intake structure is required. Experimental results show that the two seemingly conflicting design criteria, namely, achieving a low water surface elevation in the approach channel and reducing the maximum water surface elevation in the intake structure, can be simultaneously achieved by adding a radial bottom slope.