RESONANT STRUCTURES AND THEIR APPLICATION TO HARBOR PROTECTION

The principle of resonant structures is briefly described. These hydraulic resonators, which have been patented by Eleotricite de France, act as reflective structures for a range of wave periods encompassing their period of resonance, without obstructing the passages like a jetty. The originality of these structures lies in the fact that the periodicity of the waves is used to reflect them. Some dispositions of resonant structures are described: basins having a length equal to a quarter of the wave length, resonators similar to pipes of different types, one of them having a period of resonance independent of the variations of level due to the tides. Applications to harbor problems have been studied at Chatou. One of them concerns the protection of a look and of an inner harbor, the other the protection of a harbor in which resonant struotures have been used to complete the action of ordinary struotures for a certain range of wave periods.