A sluice ( ) is a water channel containing a sluice gate, a type of lock to manage the water flow and water level. There are various types of sluice gates, including flap sluice gates and fan gates. Different depths are calculated when design sluice gates.
Sluices are used for channeling water toward a water mill, including for transporting logs from steep hillsides. Different terms are used regionally for sluices; the terms sluice, sluice gate, knife gate, and slide gate are used interchangeably in the water and wastewater control industry.
Etymology
The term "sluice" originates from the Middle English word scluse, which derived from the Old French
escluse (modern French:
écluse). This, in turn, came from the Late Latin
exclusa, a shortening of
aqua exclusa, meaning "excluded water" or "a shut-off water channel". The Latin
exclusa is the feminine past participle of
excludere ("to shut out, exclude"), from
ex- ("out") and
claudere ("to close").
[Oxford English Dictionary (OED). "sluice, n." Oxford University Press. Retrieved from www.oed.com.]
Regional names
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In the Somerset Levels, sluice gates are known as clyse
[Dunning R. W. (2004). History of the County of Somerset: Volume 8: The Poldens and the Levels (Victoria County History). Oxford: Oxford University Press. .]
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Most of the inhabitants of Guyana refer to sluices as kokers.
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The Sinhala people in Sri Lanka, who had an ancient civilization based on harvested rain water, refer to sluices as Horovuwa.
Description
A
sluice is a water channel containing a
sluice gate, a movable gate allowing water to flow under it. Sluices are a type of lock to manage the water flow and water level. When a sluice is lowered, water may spill over the top, in which case the gate operates as a
weir. Usually, a mechanism drives the sluice up or down. This may be a simple, hand-operated, chain pulled/lowered,
worm drive or rack-and-pinion drive, or it may be electrically or
hydraulics powered. A flap sluice, however, operates automatically, without external intervention or inputs.
Basic design
Sluice gates are one of the most common hydraulic structures
used to control or measure the flow in open channels.
Vertical rising sluice gates are the most common in open channels and can operate under two flow regimes: free flow and submerged flow. The most important depths in the designing of sluice gates are:
Types
- Fan gate
- () This type of gate was invented by the Dutch hydraulic engineer in 1808. He was Inspector-General for Waterstaat (Water resource management) of the Kingdom of Holland at the time.
[; ] The fan door has the special property that it can open in the direction of high water solely using water pressure. This gate type was primarily used to purposely Inundation certain regions, for instance in the case of the Hollandic Water Line. Nowadays this type of gate can still be found in a few places, for example in Gouda. A fan gate has a separate chamber that can be filled with water and is separated on the high-water-level side of the sluice by a large door. When a tube connecting the separate chamber with the high-water-level side of the sluice is opened, the water level, and with that the water pressure in this chamber, will rise to the same level as that on the high-water-level side. As there is no height difference across the larger gate, it exerts no force. However the smaller gate has a higher level on the upstream side, which exerts a force to close the gate. When the tube to the low water side is opened the water level in the chamber will fall. Due to the difference in the surface areas of the doors there will be a net force opening the gate.
- Flap sluice gate
- A fully automatic type, controlled by the pressure head across it; operation is similar to that of a check valve. It is a gate hinged at the top. When pressure is from one side, the gate is kept closed; a pressure from the other side opens the sluice when a threshold pressure is surpassed.
- Mill race
- A mill race, Leat, flume, penstock or Mill race is a sluice channeling water toward a water mill.
- Needle sluice
- A sluice formed by a number of thin needles held against a solid frame through water pressure as in a needle dam.
- Radial sluice gate
- A structure, where a small part of a cylindrical surface serves as the gate, supported by radial constructions going through the cylinder's radius. On occasion, a counterweight is provided.
- Rising sector sluice gate
- Also a part of a cylindrical surface, which rests at the bottom of the channel and rises by rotating around its centre.
- Vertical rising sluice gate
- A plate sliding in the vertical direction, which may be controlled by machinery.
== Gallery ==
See also
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Canal
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List of canals by country
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Hydraulic engineering
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Control lock
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Gatehouse (waterworks) – An (elaborate) structure to house a sluice gate
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Floodgate
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Lock
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Rhyne, drainage ditch in coastal areas
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Sluice related family names
Further reading
External links
