In this paper, the barge effect on the motion responses of the tunnel element immerging by the moored barge under waves is investigated experimentally. Both the motion responses of the tunnel element and the moored barge in the experiment are simultaneously acquired by the Untouched 6-D Measurement System. The results show that the sway motion responses of the tunnel element immerging by the moored barge are different from those without the barge. For the system of the tunnel element and the moored barge, the moored barge has two motion components in the sway direction. The high frequency motion of the moored barge has little effect on the high frequency motion of the tunnel element with moored barge. However, the low frequency motion of the moored barge has a significant effect on the sway motion of the tunnel element. The motion responses of the tunnel element and the barge in the heave and roll directions are mainly the high frequency motion.
Nonlinear behaviors of a free-floating body in waves were experimentally investigated in the present study. The experiments were carried out for 6 different wave heights and 6 different wave periods to cover a relatively wide range of wave nonlinearities. A charge-coupled device(CCD) camera was used to capture the real-time motion of the floating body. The measurement data show that the sway, heave and roll motions of the floating body are all harmonic oscillations while the equilibrium position of the sway motion drifts in the wave direction. The drift speed is proportional to wave steepness when the size of the floating body is comparable to the wavelength, while it is proportional to the square of wave steepness when the floating body is relatively small. In addition, the drift motion leads to a slightly longer oscillation period of the floating body than the wave period of nonlinear wave and the discrepancy increases with the increment of wave steepness.
