The Design, Construction and Testing of a Scour Monitoring System Using Magnetostrictive Materials

Abstract

A system for the continuous monitoring of scour has been designed, constructed and implemented. The system detects the level of scour by attaching flow to a buried post at known depths, and detecting when individual sensors become unearthed. Two bio-inspired flow sensors were designed and constructed for use on the post. The first, resembling a seal whisker, utilized the magnetostrictive materials Alfenol and Galfenol and was optimized for >0.15m/s flow. The second, resembling seaweed, used a conventional permanent magnet and was optimized for <0.15m/s flow. A small, low powered data acquisition system was designed and constructed to monitor and record the data from the sensors. A total of four scour posts were installed at two different sites; two vertically to monitor conventional scour and two horizontally to monitor lateral riverbed migration. Data from the posts was analyzed and presented and lessons learned were documented.