Abstract:

In our experience the students understand better any physical phenomena when it is observed not when it is described. This is why when engineering disciplines are to be taught, the laboratory becomes an essential tool. It serves not only to better understand the physics but to motivate the students by intriguing them. However, not all the physical phenomena can be shown in a lab because its complexity or danger. Fortunately, some of them can be simulated numerically with little computational cost. Obviously, the numerical simulation has not the illustrative capacity of the experiment but, in contrast, it allows the self-learning since it is a permanently available "game" for the students who can play with the parameters freely investigating their influence in the phenomena. In the present paper we show our experience teaching the dynamical behaviour of water in the surge tanks usually installed in hydropower facilities. This issue is part of some courses of the grade of civil engineer at the University of Seville, Spain.