Hydraulic and earth engineering – Bank – shore – or bed protection – Wave or flow dissipation
Reexamination Certificate
1999-03-16
2001-05-22
Lillis, Eileen D. (Department: 3673)
Hydraulic and earth engineering
Bank, shore, or bed protection
Wave or flow dissipation
C405S021000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06234715
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an improved underwater truss structure, and more particularly to an improved underwater truss structure wherein rods of an underwater truss including a large number of mutually nonparallel rods are provided with plate-like structural members (hereinafter “brims”) having surfaces orthogonal to the rods.
2. Description of the Related Art
The present inventor earlier invented a fluid-interference structure utilizing an underwater truss that can be used as a marine structure in place of conventional concrete-caisson breakwaters, tetrapods and other such structures that rely on weight. This is a light-weight marine structure composed of units of uniform, easy-to-handle size. It can be mass-produced as a standardized product at low cost and is usable even on ground that is too weak for use of a conventional structure. The basic structure is described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 58(1983)-26443 and various improved structures are disclosed in, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 63(1988)-247413, Japanese Unexamined Utility Model Publication No. 1(1989)-180530, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2(1990)-70812, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6(1994)-136727, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6(1994)-264423, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6(1994)-280234 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 8(1996)-105030.
The basic structural unit of the underwater truss structure consists of a planar skeleton composed of rods and spheres assembled in planar interconnection and a three-dimensional skeleton of an interconnected regular triangular pyramid and a regular square pyramid. One of the disclosed structures is provided with plate-like brims having surfaces orthogonal to the rods. Basically, this underwater truss structure operates by utilizing the interference between a fluid passing through the interior of the structure and the shape of the structure to agitate the motion of the fluid and convert it into a turbulent flow. Providing disk-like brims on the rods markedly increases the contact area with the fluid per unit volume. Since this increases the capability of the structure to interfere with fluid motion, the underwater truss structure with brims is immensely more cost-effective than conventional marine structures.
The underwater truss structure with brims can provide a considerable interference effect in the case of a wave component having high kinetic energy per spatial unit. Still, irrespective of this and its ability simply to interfere with a large wave to give it a desired waveform, it cannot totally eradicate waveforms and therefore cannot perform sufficiently as a practical breakwater structure.
The underwater truss structure with brims can, however, be effectively utilized for systematically converting waves, tides, currents and other types of fluid motion into turbulent flow and eddies and/or into the microdisturbed state. Owing to its relatively light weight, moreover, the structure has the potential for practical application at low cost from the viewpoint of production, assembly and installation. Taking actual needs in coastal waters into account, therefore, it is desirable to pursue its further development toward enabling use of the sea's kinetic energy in diverse ways.
Specifically, the kinetic energy of ocean waves is potentially utilizable for various purposes, such as to improve water quality by increasing dissolved oxygen and to enhance the amount of deep-region nutrient salts conducted to and mixed with water in the photic region for instance, in order to create an environment for adherence of useful plant life. The structure should therefore desirably be improved to have control capabilities enabling such uses of wave energy in costal waters.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This invention was accomplished in light of the foregoing circumstances and has as one object to provide an underwater truss structure with brims that effectively achieves diverse interference control and further enables free control of shield factor.
The underwater truss structure according to the invention is an underwater truss structure including a large number of mutually nonparallel rods provided with plate-like brims having surfaces orthogonal to the rods, characterized in that the brims have a polygonal shape enabling gaps formed between adjacent brims to be adjusted between touching and a desired size. The shape of the brims determines the functions that the different portions of the underwater truss structure can provide.
As explained in the following, the term “gaps formed between adjacent brims” is defined broadly to encompass various types of gaps formed between adjacent brims.
When brims are provided at a fixed location on every rod, the brim surfaces can be expanded to bring their edge portions into contact along straight. lines. In this case, the brim has maximum area and is square in shape. When the brim surfaces are interconnected and expanded, the interconnected brims define a space and shielding is possible. When the areas of the brims that contact in this way when the area is maximum are mutually contracted, gaps can be formed between the brims, and the gaps enlarge as the brims contract. The method of contracting the brim area is not limited to overall contraction while maintaining similarity but also includes cutting off corners of the squares to form polygons. The shield factor of the truss structure can be freely adjusted by increasing/decreasing the area of the brims.
For example, by using twelve sphere-like connecting members formed as dodecahedrons each provided with twelve rod-fixing holes to connect a large number of rods, the brims can be made square, hexagonal or octagonal. The shield factor can then be freely adjusted by varying the size of the brims.
As shown in JP-A-8-105030, openings can be formed in the brim surfaces by trimming the edges of the brims into an irregular shape. Such openings enhance the fineness of the induced eddies.
Adjacent brims are preferably fastened together. In practice there is used a method of elastic fastening or connection that can be easily undone.
Since the underwater truss structure according to the invention adopts polygonal brims that enable the gaps between adjacent brims to be systematically adjusted to desired sizes, the underwater truss structure has enhanced performance and enables free selection of shield factor.
In actual application, the underwater truss structure can, for example, be assembled into a large-scale structure enclosing a particular region of the sea so as to enrich the biosystem within the enclosed region and thereby enable systematic enhancement of productivity. This effect can be obtained because the adjacent brims, owing to their shapes and the gaps therebetween, convert the energy of sea wave motion to produce an intermixed region of large and small eddies. Moreover, by appropriate installation of underwater truss structures with brims provided with openings by irregular trimming of edge portions as taught by JP-A-8-105030, white clouding can be forcibly induced by fine-foaming to establish an enhanced aeration effect that raises the level of dissolved oxygen to a supersaturated state, thereby achieving water quality improvement and other effects. This boosts the basic productive capacity by photosynthesis within the enclosed region and, as such, enriches the biosystem. A particular objective is to preserve kinetic energy in vortices so that water masses can be mass-transported during the process of force synthesis.
Interconnection of adjacent brims increases the strength of the overall structure and enables fabrication of a stable underwater truss structure.
REFERENCES:
patent: 1516767 (1924-11-01), Falley
patent: 2658350 (1953-11-01), Magill
patent: 3884042 (1975-05-01), Anderson et al.
patent: 4175887 (1979-11-01), Mougin
patent: 4439058 (1984-03-01), Le Mehaute
patent: 5427472 (1995-06-01), Ono
patent: 64-247413 (1988-10-01), None
patent: 0844659 (198
Lagman Frederick L.
Lillis Eileen D.
Nixon & Peabody LLP
Studebaker Donald R.
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