Abstract:
Reef breakwater is a low crested, rubble mound breakwater without a conventional multilayered cross
section. It has been identified that transmission coefficient is one of the main parameters to quantify the
performance of reef breakwaters and several parameters that influence transmission coefficient was identified.
Accordingly, a comprehensive laboratory investigation was carried out and transmission of different reef
breakwaters was studied by varying different influence parameters. It was observed that wave steepness, crest width
and depth of crest submergence are the most influential parameters on transmission coefficient. Comparison
between existing equations to calculate transmission coefficient was done using data from the present study. When
using existing equations for the same input parameters, it can be seen that estimated transmission coefficient values
differ from each other suggesting that their applicability to a real life problem is questionable. Therefore a new
improved formula to estimate transmission coefficient was derived using dimensional analysis incorporating more
influence parameters than existing equations. This formulation proved to be better than the previous equations.
