STUDENT CODE OF ETHIC

(SCE)
DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES

UTHM

I, hereby confess that I have prepared this report on my own effort. I also admit not to receive or
give any help during the preparation of this report and pledge that everything mentioned in the
report is true.

______________________
Student Signature

Name :

Matric No. :

Date :
 CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES
DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL
ENGINEERING

HYDRAULIC ENGINEERING LABORATORY

REPORT
SUBJECT CODE

TEST CODE & TITLE MMB 03 / THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING BODY

COURSE CODE

TESTING DATE

STUDENT NAME

GROUP

1.

2.

GROUP MEMBER NAMES 3.

4.

5.

LECTURER/ INSTRUCTOR/
TUTOR NAME

REPORT RECEIVED DATE

MARKS
* Please refer laboratory
rubric attached

EXAMINER COMMENT RECEIVED STAMP

 CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE NO.: 1/10
EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10

1.0 OBJECTIVE
DETERMINATION OF CENTRE GRAVITY AT DIFFERENT LEVEL ON A FLOATING BODY

2.0 LEARNING OUTCOME

At the end of this experiment, students are able to:
To identify the forces acting on floating body.
To calculate the position of the metacentre. and predict the result of the stability.
To describe the movement of the floating body according to the weight and forces acts to the
pontoon.

3.0 THEORY OF THE EXPERIMENT

When designing a vessel such as a ship, which is to float on water, it is clearly necessary to be able to
establish beforehand that it will float upright in stable equilibrium. Figure 2(a) shows such a floating body,
which is in equilibrium under the action of two equal and opposite forces, namely, its weight acting vertically
downwards through its centre of gravity and the buoyancy force of equal magnitude acting vertically upwards
at the centre of buoyancy. When in equilibrium, the points G and B lie in the same vertical line.

Figure 1: Derivation of conditions for Stability

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE NO.: 2/10
EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
The centre of gravity G may be shifted sideways by moving a jockey of weight (W j) across the width of the
body. When the jockey is moved a distance (xj) as shown in Figure 2(b), the centre of gravity of the whole
assembly moves to G. The distance GG, denoted by (xg) is given from the elementary static as
Wj xj
xg
W

The shift of the centre of gravity causes the body to tilt to a new equilibrium position, at a small angle to the
vertical, as shown in Fig 2(c), with an associate movement of the centre of buoyancy from B B. The point
B must lie vertically below G, since the body is in equilibrium in the tilted position. Let the vertical line of the
upthrust through B intersect the original line of upthrust BG at the point M, called the metacentre.
Accordingly, the equilibrium is stable if the metacentre lies above G. Provided that is small, the distance
xg
GM is given by: GM .

The dimension GM is called the metacentric height. In the experiment described below, it is measured
directly from the slope of a graph of xj against , obtained by moving a jockey across a pontoon. Which
GM = Wj . Xj
W Q

Determination of BM
The movement of the centre of buoyancy to B produces a moment of the buoyancy force about the original
centre of buoyancy B. To establish the magnitude of this moment, first consider the element of moment
exerted by a small element of change in displaced volume. An element of width x, lying at distance x from B,
has an additional depth .x due to the tilt of the body. So the volume V of the element is:
V .x.Lx Lxx .

And the element of additional buoyancy force is F wV wLxx , where W is the specific weight of
water. The element of moment about B produced by the element of force is M F .x wLx 2x .

The total moment about B is obtained by integration over the whole of the plan area of the body, in the plane
of the water surface: M w Lx dx wI .
2

In this, I represents the second moment, about the axis of symmetry, of the water plane area of the body.
Now this moment represents the movement of the upthrust wV from B to B, namely wV.BB. Equating this to
the expression for M, wV .BB ' wI .

From the geometry of the figure, BB, = .BM and eliminating BB between these last 2 equations gives BM
I
as BM
V

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 3/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
For the particular case of a body with a rectangular planform of width D and length L, the second moment ,

LD 3
I . Now the distance BG may be found from the computed or measured positions of B and of G, so
12
the metacentric height GM can be calculated by the equation GM BM BG .

4.0 EQUIPMENT
1. Plastic Sail
2. Pontoon
3. Jockey Weight

Figure 2 : Pontoon

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 4/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10

BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10

5.0 PROCEDURE
1. Measure the weight and dimension of pontoon.

2. The pontoon is suspended from a hole at one side of sail, as

indicated in figure.

3. The jockey weight is

placed at such a position on the line of symmetry as to cause

the pontoon to hang with its base roughly vertical. A pumbline

is hung from the suspension point. The height of the centre of

gravity,G of the whole suspended assembly then lies at the

point where the plumbline intersects the line of symmetry of the pontoon.

4. Measure the point G from OG. (Refer table 1)

5. Repeat step 2 to 4 for different sail.

6. With the jockey weight on the line of symmetry, small

magnetic weight are used to trim the assembly to even keel,

indicated by a zero reading on the angular scale.

7. The jockey is then moved in step across the width of the

pontoon, the corresponding angle of tilt being recorded at

each step.(Refer table 2).

8. This procedure is then repeated with the jockey traversed at a number of different heights.

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 5/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
6.0 RESULT & ANALYSIS

1. Recorded the data when experiment.

Weight and Dimensions of Pontoon

Weight of pontoon (excluding jockey weight), W p = 2.430 Nm

Weight of jockey, Wj = 0.391 Nm

Total weight of floating assembly, W = Wp + Wj = 2.821 Nm

W
Pontoon displacement, V = m3
w

Breadth of Pontoon, D = 201.8 mm = 0.2018 m

Length of Pontoon, L = 360.1 mm = 0.3601 m

Area of pontoon in plane of water surface, A = L D = 7.267 x m2

LD 3
Second Moment of area, I = 2.466 x m4
12

Depth of immersion, OC=V/A = 3.88 x = 38.8 mm

Height of centre of buoyancy B above O , OB = BC = OC/2 = 19.4 mm

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 6/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
2. Fill the table.

Table 1

Yj (mm) 105 165 225 285 345

OG (mm) 58.7 67.1 75.4 83.7 92.0

Table 2

Jockey Jockey Displacement from Centre, Xj (mm)

-45 -30 -15 0 15 30 45
Height, yj
105 -7.8 -5.2 -2.7 0 2.6 5.2 7.8
165 -6.2 -3.1 0 3.2 6.2
225 -7.7 -3.8 0 3.9 7.8
285 -5.2 0 5.2
345 -7.5 -0.1 7.4

Table 3:

Jockey Height OG (mm) Xj/ (mm/0) Metacentric BM (mm)

(mm) Height, GM (mm)

15 30 45
105 58.7 5.76 45.7 85.0

165 67.1 4.82 38.3 86.0

225 75.4 3.88 30.8 86.8

285 83.7 2.88 22.9 87.2

345 92.0 2.01 16.0 88.6

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 7/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
 Figure 3: Determine the Centre of Gravity.

Figure 4 : Dimension of pontoon

Figure 5 : Different angle for different weight position.

(Weight shown in maximum and minimum value)

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 8/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10
7.0 QUESTIONS
1) Discuss about the result of this experiment.
2) How would the stability of the pontoon be affected if it were floated on a liquid with a greater density
than that water?
3) In civil engineering practice, the stability of a floating body applied in many hydraulics works. As a
potential civil engineer, describe how this experiment can be applied in this field.
4) Question by lecturer

5) Question by lecturer

CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 9/10

EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10

8.0 Answers
CENTRE FOR DIPLOMA STUDIES PAGE: 10/10
EDITION: 1
DEPT OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
REVIEW NO.: 03
EFFECTIVE DATE: 1/7/10
EXPERIMENT: THE STABILITY OF A FLOATING
BODY AMENDMENT DATE: 1/7/10