ANGLE OF REPOSE

Gurkaran Singh
2011CH10083

INTRODUCTION
Topic Assigned Angle Of Repose
Definition - Steepest angle between
the surface of the pile and the
horizontal surface, without slipping of
powder particles
Denoted by R

FACTORS AFFECTING
ANGLE OF REPOSE
The individual material, a reflection of the
different coefficients of friction between
different substances
Size of the particles
Fine grained OR Coarse grained
Moisture
Gravity!

METHODS TO MEASURE
ANGLE OF REPOSE
Tilting Box Method

Fixed Funnel Method

Revolving Cylinder Method

NARROWING DOWN THE

PROBLEM
Novel measurement techniques being used &
their correctness

OR

Application of Angle Of Repose in

predicting Avalanches from the properties
of the granular materials

AVALANCHES
Mass of snow which becomes detached and slides down
a slope, often acquiring great bulk by fresh addition as it
descends.
Three common typesa) SLAB AVALCNHES - Formed from the snow that has
been deposited, or redeposited by wind. Characteristic
appearance of a block of snow
b) POWDER SNOW AVALANCHES - These consist of a
powder cloud, which overlies a dense avalanche. These
are formed from turbulent suspension currents.
c) WET SNOW AVALANCHES - Low velocity suspension
of snow and water, with the flow confined to the track
surface.

REASONS FOR AVALANCHES

The load on the snowpack may be only due
to gravity, in which case failure may result
either from weakening in the snowpack or
increased load due to precipitation.
Avalanches that occur in this way are known
as spontaneous avalanches
Avalanches can also be triggered by other
loads such as skiers, snowmobilers, animals
or explosives.
Seismic activity may also trigger the failure
in the snowpack and avalanches

FACTORS AFFECTING
AVALANCHES

Internal Friction of movement or Kinetic Friction

If is the angle of inclination of the natural slope, =tan is the

coefficient of kinetic friction. Dry snow without cohesion remains in
equilibrium at a slope related to the shape of the crystals. For spherical
particles, this angle is 22to 23. In cuplike crystals, has a natural
slope of 32 to 37 .

Cohesion

If the snow crystals are attached to each other, the snow acquires a
certain cohesion, which depends on the number and surface of the
contacts. Temperature has an important influence on cohesion. For
equal contact surfaces, the cohesion is stronger at lower temperatures.
A degree of humidity holds the flakes together.

Resistance To Shear

The resistance to shear is the sum of static friction and of cohesion,

POSSIBILITIES OF RUPTURE OF
THE AVALANCHE
The snow cover on a slope is drawn downwards by its weight,
in a component parallel to the slope, known as the shear
stress or the tendency to shear.
For an avalanche to be released, five breaks must occur: one
in tension at the top, two lateral shear breaks, one failure in
compression at the bottom of the slope, and one shear failure
on the supporting stratum.
Failures usually occur one after the other so that a single
break, known as the primary rupture, can often bring on the
other breaks, called secondary, and so detach a mass of snow.

If the resistances are strong enough to withstand the primary

rupture, no avalanche results

PROPERTIES AFFECTING THE ANGLE OF

REPOSE OF SNOW PARTICLES
1)SNOWPACK STRUCTURE AND ITS EFFECTS

Dendritic or stellar crystals have the highest angle of

repose(upto 80), decreasing to 35 for rounded forms. It is
known that slush can avalanche off of the slopes of 15 or less
also.

urce- The Avalanche Handbook By David McClung, Peter A. Schaerer

2. Problem definition

PROPERTIES AFFECTING THE ANGLE OF

REPOSE OF SNOW PARTICLES

l sciences it is
of repose, formed
ments, are
e will test this.

subaerially on
nd subaqueously
nd dunes. Resulting
ortant markers for
orphodynamics and
morphology of
ey differ on Mars?

Hypotheses in our study are based on the concepts of:

Rolling of particles: overcoming friction is easier in low-g

Mass flow in avalanche: driving force and friction ~mg
The sum of mechanical friction Ffriction (resulting from
particle morphology) and interparticle forces Finter
(resulting from mineralogy and scales with distance)
needs to be overcome to initiate an avalanche.

Known influences on angles of repose and types of friction:

angularity, particle
size and
interstitial
fluid
2)EFFECT OF GRAVITY
A study
was
conducted
to determine if
wall friction, static electricity
avalanche volume affects run-out length
angles
of
repose
of avalanching sediments depend on gravity and
ns:
Aim of this study: determine if angles of repose of avalanching
and thus differ on planet Mars or
thus
differ
on sediments
planet depend
Mars on
orgravity
the Moon
compared to Earth
t angle
of a
slope
the Moon compared to Earth:

erial.
avalanche starts;
oments after the
and is always
le)

1
angle

2
angle

3
angle

4
angle

Figure 4.3 Reductio

low gravity with th
mixture and set-up
Stratification is sig
0. 38g and absent in

aterials

ere flown to reduce the gravity vector. These carefully controlled flights were executed using a low-gravity
for these types of research flights. We studied discontinuous avalanching in 0.1g , 0.38g and 1g (where g=
vironment during these maneuvers had overall accuracies of
0.05g for ~15 seconds.

we used various sediments to study the influence of the properties on the angles of repose of sediments:
nts, fine / coarse sediments and air / water as interstitial fluid.

le-shaw cell) was used to study the influence of gravity on auto-organization processes using bi-dispersed
segregated deposits, and their individual grain species (angular & rounded particles and glass bea ds).

ering were used for the measurements of the angles and LED time markers were used to link the image fra
cceleration and flight data.

Avalanche aquaria
(hele-shaw cell)
0.2 m

Source-Reduced gravity causes larger-volume and lower-angle granular avalanches

with less stratification by Sebastiaan J. de Vet, Maarten G. Kleinhans, H. Markies,
A.C. in 't Veld, F.N. Postema, J.J.W.A. van Loon
HD video
cameras

0.14 RPM

Cameras

raf t: the Cessna Citation II (left), the rotating drum set -up to test various sediments and interstitial media (centre) and the hele-shaw cells.

PROPERTIES AFFECTING THE ANGLE OF

REPOSE OF SNOW PARTICLES
It was found that in reduced gravity:
number of inter-particle contacts decreases,
distances increase
component Finter in (Ffriction+Finter) reduces
reduction of total friction, lowering the threshold
angle during avalanching
which implies that the addition of a surface force by
e.g. static electricity would increase the total
friction, leading to an increase in the repose angle.
Source-Reduced gravity causes larger-volume and lower-angle granular avalanches
with less stratification by Sebastiaan J. de Vet, Maarten G. Kleinhans, H. Markies,
A.C. in 't Veld, F.N. Postema, J.J.W.A. van Loon

Five different kinds of sizes of spherical grains are used

in our experiment with their diameters (0.30 0.10) mm,
(0.90 0.10) mm, (1.50 0.10) mm, (2.75 0.25) mm
and (4.75 0.25) mm, respectively. The avalanche is an
intermittent avalanche because the time interval between
avalanches is far longer than the duration of avalanche.
Figure 2 shows the relation between the angle of repose
and the granular size for different angles of the chute
plane with B0 for 0.0, B5 for 5.0, B7 for 7.0 and B9 for
9.0, respectively. For convenience, the granular diame- The same experiments have been performed for different angles of chute plane and we find that it is a genters used are the average diameters for each kind of graneral trend of r exponential decay as
increases, which
ules. Obviously, the angle of repose increases with increasing granular diameter for a given angle of chute plane. has no relation with the angles of chute plane .

PROPERTIES AFFECTING THE ANGLE OF

REPOSE OF SNOW PARTICLES

3)EFFECT OF GRANULAR SIZE OF SNOW ON THE

ANGLE OF REPOSE IN A CHUTE

The angle of repose in the chute has exponential

decay
, which
is the
reciprocal of granular
Experimentswith
and simulations
performed
by previously investigators are mainly on phenomena of granular The underlying mechanism for the increase of the anavalanche
for different
width W with the same
gle of repose with granular size is due to the fact that
diameter
d, chute
=1/d.
Figure 2 Angle of repose as a function of granular diameter for different
Figure 3 Angle of repose as a function of
for different angles of the
angles of the chute plane:
, = 0.0; +, = 5.0;
, = 7.0; +, = 9.0.chute plane:
, = 0.0; +, = 5.0;
, = 7.0; +
, = 9.0. The dashed
curve is fitted exponential decay for = 7.0.

grains. It is suggested that the ratio of chute width to

arches are formed in the pile. Both sidewalls in our exdiameter W/d increases with increasing the width for periment
a
are not absolutely smooth and arches are
SourceZHOU
Ying
and
ZHANG
GuoQin.
Effect
of
granular
on of
the
given granular diameter, which has the same effect with
formed because of the size
existence
theangle
friction of
between
decreasing
granular
diameter
for a given
width.
the
sidewalls
and granules,
which vol.
increases
stability
repose the
in the
chute.
Sci China
Ser chute
G-Phys
Mech
Astron,
Apr. 2009,
52,the
no.
4,
Therefore,
of the pile. The reciprocal of granular diameter
de563-565further study is performed as to the angle of
repose and the reciprocal of granular diameter
= 1/d
.
creases
with the increase of diameter, which results in

con
the
per
mm
chu
nen
F
tion
dia
ang
dia
mm
how
ang
ava
sim

We
siz
res
is
lan
the
can
chu
for
sid

PROPERTIES AFFECTING THE ANGLE OF

REPOSE OF SNOW PARTICLES
4) MOISTURE IN SNOW
As liquid is added to the snow spheres, it is observed that particle
clusters (clumps) develop, whose size increases with liquid content. The
presence of such clusters leads to the dependence ofr on the values of
tliq (thickness of liquid layer)

Development of clusters - a transition from a regime where the bulk

properties are associated with the dynamics of individual grains to a
Source- Albert R, Albert I, Hornbaker D, et al. Maximum angle of stability in wet
regime where long-range correlations control the material behavior
and dry spherical granular media. Phys Rev E, 1997, 56(6):R6271-R6274

CONCLUSION
An attempt to :
a) Clearly understand the concept of
Avalanches and the forces behind it
b) Explain the mechanism of Avalanches
c) Describe the factors affecting Avalanches
with suitable importance

REFERENCES
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalanche
The Avalanche Handbook By David McClung, Peter A. Schaerer
Reduced gravity causes larger-volume and lower-angle granular avalanches with
less stratification by Sebastiaan J. de Vet, Maarten G. Kleinhans, H. Markies, A.C. in
't Veld, F.N. Postema, J.J.W.A. van Loon
Nowak S, Samadani A, Kudrolli A. Maximum angle of stability a wet granular pile.
Nat Phys, 2005, 1(1): 50-52Lee J, Herrmann H J. Angle of repose and angle of
marginal stability:
Molecular dynamics of granular particles. J Phys A-Math Gen, 1993,26(2): 373-383
Liu C H, Jaeger H M, Nagel S R. Finite-size effects in a sandpile. Phys Rev A, 1991,
43(12): 7091-7092
Albert R, Albert I, Hornbaker D, et al. Maximum angle of stability in wet and dry
spherical granular media. Phys Rev E, 1997, 56(6):R6271-R6274
ZHOU Ying and ZHANG GuoQin. Effect of granular size on the angle of repose in
the chute. Sci China Ser G-Phys Mech Astron, Apr. 2009, vol. 52, no. 4, 563-565

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