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On the threshold for wave breaking of two-dimensional deep water wave groups in the absence and presence of wind

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 December 2016

Arvin Saket ,
William L. Peirson ,
Michael L. Banner ,
Xavier Barthelemy  and
Michael J. Allis
Arvin Saket*
Affiliation:
Water Research Laboratory, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Australia, 110 King St., Manly Vale, NSW 2093, Australia
William L. Peirson
Affiliation:
Water Research Laboratory, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Australia, 110 King St., Manly Vale, NSW 2093, Australia
Michael L. Banner
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics and Statistics, UNSW Australia, Sydney 2052, Australia
Xavier Barthelemy
Affiliation:
Water Research Laboratory, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Australia, 110 King St., Manly Vale, NSW 2093, Australia School of Mathematics and Statistics, UNSW Australia, Sydney 2052, Australia
Michael J. Allis
Affiliation:
Water Research Laboratory, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Australia, 110 King St., Manly Vale, NSW 2093, Australia National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, Hamilton 3251, New Zealand
*
†Email address for correspondence: a.saket@wrl.unsw.edu.au
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Abstract

The threshold for the onset of breaking proposed by Barthelemy et al. (arXiv:1508.06002v1, 2015) has been investigated in the laboratory for unidirectional wave groups in deep water and extended to include different classes of wave groups and moderate wind forcing. Thermal image velocimetry was used to compare measurements of the wave crest point (maximum elevation and also the point of maximum) surface water particle velocity ($U_{s}$) with the wave crest point speed ($C$) determined by an array of closely spaced wave gauges. The crest point surface energy flux ratio $B_{x}=U_{s}/C$ that distinguishes maximum recurrence from marginal breaking was found to be $0.840\pm 0.016$. Increasing wind forcing from zero to $U_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D706}/4}/C_{0}=1.42$ systematically increased this threshold by 2 %. Increasing the spectral bandwidth (decreasing the Benjamin–Feir index from 0.39 to 0.31) systematically reduced the threshold by 1.5 %.

JFM classification

Waves/Free-surface Flows: Surface gravity waves Waves/Free-surface Flows: Waves/Free-surface Flows Waves/Free-surface Flows: Wave breaking
Type
Papers
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 811 , 25 January 2017 , pp. 642 - 658
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Copyright
© 2016 Cambridge University Press 

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