Coastalock™ Performance on a Permeable Breakwater Slope: Model Tests on the Influence of a Permeable Core, Unit Modifications and Toe Support on the Hydraulic Performance of an Ecological Armour Unit

Coastal areas face increasing threat from erosion. The use of coastal protection structures is imperative to counter this. Concrete “armouring” is widely used due to durability and cost-effectiveness. Conventional methods of “armouring” result in habitat degradation and loss of biodiversity. ECOncrete developed Coastalock, an armour unit...

Assessing the Important Factors for Obtaining Technological Dominance in the Concrete Armour Unit Industry

The concrete armour unit industry exist for more than 70 years, in this period various units were developed. The first units derived their hydraulic stability on their own weight, later the units got more complex shapes and got interlocking capabilities. The first interlocking units were placed in a two-layer configuration, like Tetrapod and...

Homogeneous detached composite breakwater: CFD study of the design sensitivities in the 2D geometrical layout using a detached homogeneous low-crested structure to reduce sea wall overtopping

In this research OpenFOAM is used to model and determine the complex hydrodynamic behaviour of a Homogeneous low-crested structure (HLCS) consisting of cubipod artificial concrete elements. The validated model is used to gain insight in the design sensitivities of a two dimensional cross sectional layout to reduce sea wall overtopping. HLCS and...

Experimental investigation of the spatial and temporal variation of rocking armour units: Rocking Revisited V

The purpose of this MSc thesis is to do an experimental study into the spatial and temporal variation of rocking armour units. Armour units on a breakwater slope under wave loading can sometimes start to move back and forth, this phenomenon is known as rocking. Rocking can lead to significant impacts between armour units, which can result in...

Rocking revisited 4: Analysis of rocking-induced stresses for concrete breakwater armour units

When a breakwater is under heavy wave attack, the concrete armour units will occasionally move, causing a collision between two concrete armour units. This process is called rocking, and induces stresses in the concrete, that may lead to breakage of the concrete armour units. This MSc Thesis provides a probabilistic method to predict breakage of...

Effect of irregularities in the under layer on the stability of Xbloc^Plus concrete armour unit

The Xbloc^Plus is a new type of single layer armour unit for breakwaters. The key difference between earlier single layer armour units is that the unit is not only placed in a regular grid, but also with a regular orientation. The main benefit of this is that it can directly be seen whether the unit is placed correctly. Additionally,...

Smart Rocking Armour Units

This paper describes a method to measure the rocking motion of lab-scale armour units. Sensors as found in mobile phones are used. These sensors, data-storage and battery are all embedded in the model units, such that they can be applied without wires attached to them. The technique is applied to double-layer units in order to compare the...

Exploration into the mechanisms that govern the stability of an Xbloc^{+ v1} armour unit

In this MSc thesis it is investigated how the first version of concrete armour unit Xbloc⁺, Xbloc^{+ v1}, acquires its stability. The stability mechanisms are investigated by conducting two type of physical model tests. First, 23 dry pull-out tests are done to obtain insights into the aspects and mechanisms that influence the...

Numerical modelling of forces, stresses and breakages of concrete armour units

Numerical modelling has the potential to probe the complexity of the interacting physics of rubble mound armour systems. Through forward modelling of armour unit packs, stochastic variables such as unit displacement and maximum contact force per unit during an external oscillatory disturbance can be predicted. The combined finite-discrete...

Bizerte-Zarzouna fishing harbour, Tunisia: Accropode block dropping tests

Droptests executed for the port of Bizerta in Tunesia on concrete armour units.