The reflection coefficient of sloping walls

The reflection coefficient of sloping solid walls was developed theoretically and verified experimentally. In the theoretical derivation, a sloping solid wall was simulated by an N-step staircase. In this circumstance, each stair step would raise a sub-reflected wave, and N stairs would raise N sub-reflected waves. Then the reflected wave from the staircase was assumed to be a superposition of these N sub-reflected waves. As a result, letting N approach infinity would make the reflected wave from the staircase become equivalent to the reflected wave from the sloping solid wall. Practically, a number of steps rather than infinity was selected for N when the reflection coefficient of the sloping wall was calculated. After the appropriate N number was selected, reflection coefficients of sloping walls with varied wall slopes were calculated under different wave conditions. Results showed that the reflection coefficient is closely related to the incident wave period and the wall slope for h/L < 0.5. As for h/L > 0.5, the reflection coefficient is merely a function of wall slope. To verify theoretical calculations, experimental tests were performed and compared with theoretical results. Agreement between theory and experiment is good.