A study of rectangular tuned liquid damper using a mometum conserving formulation and experimental verification

Rectangular tanks filled with shallow liquid, also know as shallow-water type Tuned Liquid Dampers, have been investigated by several researchers. Common to the approaches is that an energy conserving form of the nonlinear shallow water equations is used for describing the sloshing motion. This form, also known as the velocity formulation, breaks down when discontinuities in the surface or waves are formed. In the current paper we use a formulation of the nonlinear shallow water equations based on momentum conservation instead. Using this approach the energy dissipation as a result of discontinuities is captured by the method. Numerical simulations and experimental results show surprisingly well agreement, taking the degree of nonlinearity in consideration, and that no calibration is performed of the numerical model.