| dc.description.abstract | In today s world we are currently experiencing dramatic increase in the amount of people and property that are vulnerable to severe flooding. This is leading to a growing demand for im- proved flood protection, where mobile flood barriers play an important role. These systems, when required by the private consumer, or in areas where resources are limited, need to be relatively inexpensive to acquire, intuitive and quick to install, and effortless to store, all while providing a high level of security against flooding. Designing such a system is challenging. One of the main challenges is in designing the gasket between the flood barrier and the ground that it is installed on. In consumer model flood barriers there is very little clamping force on this gas- ket at low water levels, making it difficult to create a one-design-fits-all system that seals well against a variety of surfaces. In this thesis, prototyping and testing were used as a framework to gain an in-depth understanding of some of the physical principles behind high performing gasket concepts. Several tests and test setups were designed in order to acquire useful knowl- edge, not only in the development of this particular gasket, but also for future exploration and development in the field. Finally, several concepts aiming to solve a handful of other challenges related to the flood barrier were presented, and analyzed in order to select the best solutions. The result of this work is a novel gasket solution accompanied with a suggestion to how it can be deployed in a consumer model flood barrier. | en |
