Donald D. Gray
Published: 2016-10-01
Total Pages: 670
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Since 1999 ?A First Course in Fluid Mechanics for Civil Engineers? has been a popular course textbook, offering fewer topics but in greater depth. This expanded 2nd edition still features a civil engineering perspective which are the consistent stress on the concept of head and the use of the total and piezometric head lines as qualitative tools. Emphasis is placed on the Euler equation in natural coordinates and the parallel flow assumption. The Bernoulli equation, derived by integrating the Euler equation along a streamline, is carefully distinguished from the mechanical energy equation, in which loss terms appear. Open channel flow and hydraulic models are treated in more depth than is customary. To maintain a reasonable length, topics such as boundary layers, drag, lift, potential flow, hydraulic machines, pipe networks, computational fluid dynamics, and compressible flow have been condensed or omitted.This 2nd Edition is still intended for a one-semester introduction to fluid mechanics for majors in civil engineering and related fields such as environmental and agricultural engineering. Over the years, this textbook has confirmed the merit of an introductory textbook on fluid mechanics seen from the perspective of students whose main interest is incompressible flow in a gravitational field. While maintaining this approach, this 2nd Edition incorporates many improvements. Perhaps the most significant is the increase in the number of homework problems from 216 to 775, far more than are needed for a semester course, allowing instructors to maintain freshness from semester to semester. This set includes a wide range of problem types in order to appeal to diverse student interests and learning styles. Both SI and U.S. Customary units are used in the problems and throughout the text. A section on ?Advice to the Student? has been added to provide guidance on effective study habits. The perennially confusing topic of uncertainty and significant digits is explained in a new appendix. All of the examples are now set in boxes to make them easier to locate and reference. Clarifications have been made throughout the text to improve comprehension, and new figures and photographs have been added.