Avalanche dynamics on a rough inclined plane

Abstract

Avalanche behavior of gravitationally-forced granular layers on a rough inclined plane are investigated experimentally for different materials and for a variety of grain shapes ranging from spherical beads to highly anisotropic particles with dendritic shape. We measure the front velocity, area and the height of many avalanches and correlate the motion with the area and height. We also measure the avalanche profiles for several example cases. As the shape irregularity of the grains is increased, there is a dramatic qualitative change in avalanche properties. For rough non-spherical grains, avalanches are faster, bigger and overturning in the sense that individual particles have down-slope speeds $u_p$ that exceed the front speed $u_f$ as compared with avalanches of spherical glass beads that are quantitatively slower, smaller and where particles always travel slower than the front speed. There is a linear increase of three quantities i) dimensionless avalanche height ii) ratio of particle to front speed and iii) the growth rate of avalanche speed with increasing avalanche size with increasing $\tanθ_r$ where $θ_r$ is the bulk angle of repose, or with increasing $β_P$, the slope of the depth averaged flow rule, where both $θ_r$ and $β_P$ reflect the grain shape irregularity. These relations provide a tool for predicting important dynamical properties of avalanches as a function of grain shape irregularity. A relatively simple depth-averaged theoretical description captures some important elements of the avalanche motion, notably the existence of two regimes of this motion.