Design methods for confined flows

Most seepage problems of interest are highly complex, leading to solutions using approximate methods such as finite-difference or finite-element method and graphical flow-net analyses. The designer's ingenuity lies in the choice of a computational method that most reasonably approximates real life but still permits a solution to be obtained The graphical trial and error procedures are, at present the most widely applied method of solving seepage problems. However, to solve a complex these problem involving investigations of the influence of a range of characteristic dimensions by means of flow nets would certainly require prodigious amounts of labor. The paper therefore, outlines computer-aided analyses based on the method of fragments originally developed by Pavlovsky in 1956 and was later extended by Harr (1962). Since computational capabilities with digital computers have, for all practical purposes, surpassed engineers' ability to investigate parameters with which they have to deal, the key to improving educational effectiveness with geotechnical courses dealing with the design of confined seepage certainly rests on multiplying the time the student actually spends learning basic design skills through working out a comprehensive range of problems.