CSE20202:

Fluid Mechanics for Civil Engineering

Lecture – 05
Fluid Statics – II

by
Dr. HF Duan
Associate Professor of Hydraulics
([email protected])

Online Teaching, 12:30–14:30, Wednesday

2019/2020, Semester 2
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
 John Ninomiya flying a cluster of 72 helium-filled
balloons over Temecula, California in April of 2003.
The helium balloons displace approximately 230 m3
of air, providing the necessary buoyant force.
Don’t try this at home!
Objectives & Study Outcomes
• Part – I (Previous Lecture):
✓ Determine the variation of pressure in a fluid at rest
✓ Calculate pressure using various kinds of
manometers
✓ Calculate the forces exerted by a fluid at rest on
plane submerged surfaces
• Part – II (This Lecture):
✓ Review on Part – I
✓ Calculate the forces exerted by a fluid at rest on
curved submerged surfaces
✓ Analyze the stability of floating and submerged
bodies 3
■ Review on Previous Lecture
(This is a review on the previous lecture)
Fluid statics: Deals with problems associated with fluids at rest.
The fluid can be either gaseous or liquid.
Hydrostatics: When the fluid is a liquid.
Aerostatics: When the fluid is a gas.
In fluid statics, there is no relative motion between adjacent fluid layers,
and thus there are no shear (tangential) stresses in the fluid trying
to deform it.
The only stress we deal with in fluid statics is the normal stress, which
is the pressure, and the variation of pressure is due only to the
weight of the fluid.
The topic of fluid statics has significance only in gravity fields.
The design of many engineering systems such as water dams and
liquid storage tanks requires the determination of the forces acting
on the surfaces using fluid statics. 4
■ Review on Previous Lecture
HYDROSTATIC FORCES ON THE
SUBMERGED PLANE SURFACES

The resultant force acting on a plane

surface is equal to the product of the
pressure at the centroid of the surface
and the surface area, and its line of
action passes through the center of
pressure.

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 Special Case 1:

Hydrostatic force acting on the

top surface of a submerged
vertical rectangular plate.

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 Special Case 2:

Hydrostatic force acting on the

top surface of a submerged
horizontal rectangular plate.

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Example

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5-min’s Break!!!

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 ■ HYDROSTATIC FORCES ON SUBMERGED
CURVED SURFACES

Determination of the hydrostatic force acting on a submerged curved surface.

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In many structures of
practical application,
the submerged
surfaces are not flat,
but curved as here at
Glen Canyon Dam in
Utah and Arizona.
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When a curved surface is above
the liquid, the weight of the liquid The hydrostatic force acting on a circular
and the vertical component of the surface always passes through the center
hydrostatic force act in the of the circle since the pressure forces are
opposite directions. normal to the surface and they all pass 13
through the center.
In a multilayered fluid of different densities can be determined by:
(1) considering different parts of surfaces in different fluids as different
surfaces,
(2) finding the force on each part, then
(3) adding them using vector addition. For a plane surface, it can be
expressed as

The hydrostatic force on a

surface submerged in a
multilayered fluid can be
determined by considering parts
of the surface in different fluids
as different surfaces.
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Schematic for the above
example and the free-body
diagram of the liquid
underneath the cylinder.

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5-min’s Break!!!

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■ BUOYANCY AND STABILITY
Buoyant force: The upward force a fluid exerts on a body immersed in it.
The buoyant force is caused by the increase of pressure with depth in a fluid.

The buoyant force acting on

the plate is equal to the
weight of the liquid
displaced by the plate.
For a fluid with constant
density, the buoyant force is
independent of the distance of
the body from the free surface.
It is also independent of the
density of the solid body.

A flat plate of uniform thickness h submerged

in a liquid parallel to the free surface.

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 (1) The buoyant forces acting on a solid body
submerged in a fluid and on a fluid body
of the same shape at the same depth are
identical.
(2) The buoyant force FB acts upward
through the centroid C of the displaced
volume and is equal in magnitude to the
weight W of the displaced fluid, but is
opposite in direction.
(3) For a solid of uniform density, its weight
Ws also acts through the centroid, but its
magnitude is not necessarily equal to that
of the fluid it displaces. (Here Ws > W and
thus Ws > FB; this solid body would sink.)

Archimedes’ principle: The buoyant force acting on a body immersed

in a fluid is equal to the weight of the fluid displaced by the body, and it
acts upward through the centroid of the displaced volume.

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For floating bodies, the weight of the entire body must be equal to the
buoyant force, which is the weight of the fluid whose volume is equal to the
volume of the submerged portion of the floating body:

A solid body dropped into

a fluid will sink, float, or
remain at rest at any point
in the fluid, depending on
its average density relative
to the density of the fluid.

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The altitude of a hot air
balloon is controlled by the
temperature difference
between the air inside and
outside the balloon, since
warm air is less dense than
cold air. When the balloon
is neither rising nor falling,
the upward buoyant force
exactly balances the
downward weight.

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5-min’s Break!!!

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 Stability of Immersed and
Floating Bodies

Stability is easily
understood by
analyzing a ball
on the floor.

For floating bodies such as ships, stability

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is an important consideration for safety.
 A ball in a trough between
two hills is stable for small
disturbances, but unstable
for large disturbances.
When the center of gravity G of an immersed
neutrally buoyant body is not vertically
aligned with the center of buoyancy B of the
body, it is not in an equilibrium state and
would rotate to its stable state, even without
any disturbance.

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A floating body is stable if the body is bottom-heavy and thus the center of
gravity G is below the centroid B of the body, or if the metacenter M is above
point G. However, the body is unstable if point M is below point G.

Metacentric height GM: The distance between the center of gravity

G and the metacenter M—the intersection point of the lines of action
of the buoyant force through the body before and after rotation.
The length of the metacentric height GM above G is a measure of the
stability: the larger it is, the more stable is the floating body. 24
 Summary

• Hydrostatic Forces on Submerged

Curved Surfaces

• Buoyancy and Stability

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Examples & Homework

- Tutorials Class…
- Problems in Homework Set #2 (access
on the Blackboard Website)…
- Additional Reading Materials for Lectures
04 & 05…

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 Q/A
(online interaction)

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