Flow of a liquid may take place either as open channel flow or pressure flow.  Pressure flow takes place in a closed conduit such as a pipe, and pressure is the primary driving force for the flow.  For open channel flow, on the other hand the flowing liquid has a free surface at atmospheric pressure and the driving force is gravity.  Open channel flow takes place in natural channels like rivers and streams.  It also occurs in manmade channels such as those used to transport wastewater and in circular sewers flowing partially full.

In this course several aspects of open channel flow will be presented, discussed and illustrated with examples.  The main topic of this course is uniform open channel flow, in which the channel slope, liquid velocity and liquid depth remain constant.  First, however, several ways of classifying open channel flow will be presented and discussed briefly.

After completing this course you will have knowledge about the basic nature of flow in open channels and the common ways of classifying open channel flow (laminar or turbulent, steady state or unsteady state, uniform or non-uniform, and critical, subcritical or supercritical).  Practice in the use of the Manning equation for a variety of uniform open channel flow calculations will be gained through several worked examples.  Upon completing this course, you will be prepared to take more advanced open channel flow courses.