Wave-Action Tests In Model Port

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32053, 30 July 1969, Page 30

Wave-Action Tests In Model Port

(New Zealand Press Association)

NEW PLYMOUTH, July 29. I Port Taranaki has been reproduced in model form by the engineering staff of the ! Taranaki Harbour Board.

Under the supervision of Mr A. C. Visser, an engineer’s assistant with the board, a 1-100 scale model has been built of the area around the new Blyde, Newton King and Moturoa wharves. Mr Visser said today that the model would be flooded with water to test wave action in the basin between Newton King and Blyde wharves.

The model has been built in a concrete block tank. The “harbour bottom" has been made of concrete laid on hardboard. Irregularities on the bottom follow irregularities on the actual harbour floor.

A rotating drum would be used to create a wave action; Mr Visser said. Adjustment of the drum along its axis would 'create waves of vary; ing sizes. Scale models of ships were being made by carpenters: The models would-be floated in the tank and secured to the wharves by scaled-down moorings. “We will be able to test the effects of wave actions on ships of varying lengths,” Mr Visser said. ‘ We plan to use a couple of 560 ft-long ships (actually sft 6in long) and two 200 ft ships (actually 2ft long),” he said.