TIPS
These will help you get the most out of RIVERMorph®. If you have a tip to contribute, e-mail it to info@rivermorph.com.
Determining Sinuosity
Need to determine sinuosity? Well, there are two different approaches.
First, if your data set is an ESRI shape file, all you need to do is select the particular stream you are interested in and click on the Sinuosity button. It's that easy!
Or, if your data is not an ESRI shape file or if the shape file extends beyond the reach you are interested in, you will need to digitize the stream first. To do this, click on the Digitize Line and Determine Sinuosity button, and click in the viewing area to trace the pattern of the stream of interest. Then, once you are done digitizing, double-click and click 'yes.' Just a few simple steps and you're on your way!
Narrow belt width? Unexpected utility lines in the way?
RIVERMorph® can help! Check out the Results page in the Natural Channel Design module, the slider control will let you adjust the deflection angle and decrease belt width to analyze hundreds of channel configurations in minutes.
Want an easy way to measure facet slopes?
Use RIVERMorph®'s measurement tool on your longitudinal profile graph. Just click anywhere on the graph and drag your mouse to activate distance, depth and slope measurements. The program automatically stores your measurements and calculates minimum, average and maximum values for you to populate your dimensionless ratios database. This graphical method will save you time!
Ever get back into the office and plot up your survey data only to find out that you misread a water depth?
RIVERMorph® makes it easy to smooth out this data so that you no longer have water flowing uphill! Use the graphical water surface editing tool on the profile graph to drag water surface points to where you know they should be.
Do you use a total station to collect survey data?
If so, RIVERMorph® provides an interface to easily extract longitudinal profile and cross section data from your x,y,z data. Just provide the correct point identification tags and use the scatter plot to export the series into RIVERMorph®'s cross section or profile editor. A few simple mouse clicks will transform your total station data into useful cross sections or profiles.
A lot of restoration projects have side-inlets that may have to be relocated or resized to accommodate your new meandering river.
RIVERMorph® provides you with a method for sizing side inlets in the Resistance Equation Calculator. You can use the pipe diameter and roughness scroll bars to evaluate hundreds of combinations in seconds! The calculator will tell you the size of pipe needed for the given slope and roughness criteria.
RIVERMorph® has an option to ignore side channel depressions in the cross section calculations.
The toolbar has a new feature allowing you to specify two stations and an elevation. If you select this option RIVERMorph® will overlay a new graph that ignores depressions between the two stations. Use this feature when off-channel depressions are not hydraulically linked back to the channel in the downstream direction.
RIVERMorph® comes with an overlay feature to allow multiple cross sections to be viewed on the same graph.
Use this feature for monitoring reports and to overlay existing and proposed cross sections. With a click of a button, you can even calculate the difference in area between the two sections!
RIVERMorph® GIS will simplify the measurement of meander wavelength, belt width, radius of curvature and sinuosity!
With a click of the mouse, develop dimensionless ratios data from file formats such as ESRI shape files, CAD drawing files, MrSID image files, JPEG files and many others! You can even set your scale on aerial photographs by simply clicking the button to the far right of the menu bar and tracing a line of known length on the image.
How can you tell if a particular gravel bed stream is a reference reach?
There are often conflicting opinions about how to define a reference reach. You can use RIVERMorph® to help you make this determination using the following procedure:
- Use the Pfankuch Channel Stability Rating: a reference reach should have a 'good' rating.
- Use the Stream Visual Assessment Protocol: a reference reach should have a 'good' or 'excellent' rating.
- Use the sediment transport competency calculator (shown here) to estimate the mean depth required for transporting the largest particle found in the bar (or other depositional feature). Compare this mean depth to the value from a riffle cross section, if the values are close then you may have a reference reach. If the values differ greatly then the reach is probably not a reference reach.
RIVERMorph® can help you analyze hydraulic properties by creating graphs of selected variables at each cross section.
For example, you can use the Discharge and Sediment Transport Wizard to calculate shear stress as a function of depth (or elevation). Then go to the 'Stages' page in the Cross Section editor and click 'Graph.' You can then select variables from a long list of hydraulic calculations. Here is a plot of Elevation vs. Shear Stress.
In the Rosgen Classification of Natural Rivers, values of entrenchment ratio can vary by plus or minus 0.2 and values for width to depth ratios can vary by plus or minus 2.0.
When you use RIVERMorph® to perform a classification, you can use the slider controls shown here to adjust the entrenchment ratio and/or width to depth ratio within these ranges to see if the classification changes. The classification value may change when your reach is on the border between two categories. This allows you to evaluate multiple combinations in a matter of seconds.
Did you know you could export typical sections from the NCD module into the Cross Sections module?
This is useful when you want to calculate hydraulics by stage or evaluate sediment transport through the design reach. Just click the 'XS Exp' button and provide a cross section name. RIVERMorph® will add a node to the impacted reach with the geometry from the NCD output. Now you can overlay the design cross section on the impacted reaches cross sections and compute cut/fill quantities.