Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143

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Journal of Hydrology
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhydrol

Water infiltration underneath single-ring permeameters and hydraulic

conductivity determination
Qinbo Cheng a, Xi Chen a,⇑, Xunhong Chen b, Zhicai Zhang a, Minhua Ling a
a
State Key Laboratory of Hydrology Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China
b
School of Natural Resources, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68583, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o s u m m a r y

Article history: A single-ring permeameter is suitable for measurement of soil hydraulic conductivity at a large-field scale
Received 4 June 2010 because of its simple structure, easy operation, portability, small amount of recharging water and partic-
Received in revised form 11 December 2010 ularly because of its variable radius. The authors established a simple single-ring permeameter which
Accepted 17 December 2010
consists of a hollow cylinder that is simply inserted into the top soil. Based on the theories of the Philip
Available online 23 December 2010
and Nestingen methods for single-ring permeameter tests, this paper presents new equations for describ-
This manuscript was handled by P. Baveye, ing 1-D infiltration within the inserted depth of the single-ring infiltrometer and 3-D flow beyond the
Editor-in-Chief depth under both gravity and soil suction forces. The soil hydraulic parameters of hydraulic conductivity
and soil suction were optimized based on the declines of the ponded water depth within the single-ring
Keywords: cylinder. The new method was validated using numerical simulations of the declines of the water column
Hydraulic conductivity within the cylinder through the variably saturated flow MODFLOW (VSF-MODFLOW). The new method
Falling head infiltration experiment was then successfully applied in laboratory troughs and on a hillslope in Huanjiang County, northwest
Single-ring permeameter Guangxi in southwest China. The results demonstrate that the hydraulic conductivity determined by
the new method is more accurate than those from the 1-D Green-Ampt method and the 3-D Nestingen
method.
Ó 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The measurement of watershed hydrogeological parameters,
such as soil hydraulic conductivity, is very important for investiga-
tion of hydrological processes of infiltration, groundwater recharge
and runoff generation (e.g. Bicknell et al., 1984; Mark et al., 2004;
Markstrom et al., 2008). At present, the commonly used methods
for the in situ measurement of hydraulic conductivity are single/
double ring infiltrometers, disc tension infiltrometers and well per-
meameters (Reynolds and Elrick, 1986, 1990). These methods pri-
marily rely on the attainment of a steady state rate of water
seepage into the soil (Reynolds, 1993). This requirement limits their
field use either because short duration steady-state experiments
cannot be conducted in soils with a low conductivity (Elrick and
Reynolds, 1992a,b) or because more water is required for soils with
a high hydraulic conductivity for maintaining a steady-state water
head. A simplified falling head (SFH) technique for rapid determina-
tion of hydraulic conductivity using small volumes of water and
easily transportable equipment was proposed by Bagarello et al.
(2004). It is suitable for measurement of soil hydraulic conductivity
at a large-field scale with a large ring diameter, e.g. larger than a
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 25 83786981; fax: +86 25 83786606.
E-mail address: xichen@hhu.edu.cn (X. Chen).
0.3 m ring to reduce edge effects (Bouwer, 1986), and for complet-
ing measurements as many locations as possible.
In the aspect of equations for describing soil infiltration of the
ponded water during the falling head permeameter test and for
measuring soil hydraulic conductivity, Philip (1992) provided
one-dimensional infiltration flow equations based on the Green-
Ampt model (Green and Ampt, 1911). For an approximate analysis
of the falling head borehole permeameter, Philip (1993) derived
well flow equations based on spherically symmetric Green-Ampt
analysis and established a two-point method to calculate soil suc-
tion C and vertical hydraulic conductivity K. Based on Philip’s the-
ory, Muñoz-Carpena (2002) designed the Philip–Dunne falling
head permeameter (Fig. 1) and developed software for calculating
C and K. Regalado et al. (2005) obtained an empirical formula to cal-
culate C and K based on results of laboratory and field experiments
using the Philip–Dunne Falling-Head Permeameter. Nestingen
(2007) developed a modified Philip–Dunne (MPD) falling head infil-
trometer which consists of a hollow cylinder that is simply inserted
into the top soil rather than into a borehole like the Philip–Dunne
permeameter, and modified the spherically symmetric Green-Ampt
equation to make a capped spherical symmetric Green-Ampt equa-
tion for estimating the vertical hydraulic conductivity (Fig. 2).
For a single-ring inserted into soil (Fig. 3a), the forces acting on
the wetting front of infiltration include gravity, head pressure of
the ponded water in the cylinder and soil suction. Numerical

0022-1694/$ - see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2010.12.017
136 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143

Fig. 1. Geometrical analog of the Philip–Dunne falling head permeameter (from Regalado et al., 2005). Note: h0, h1, . . . h3 are the water levels in the tube at times t0, t1, . . . t3,
respectively; tmed and tmax are two infiltration times for computing both Ks and the Green-Ampt suction C at the wetting front; the quasi-spherical bulb in the left is the actual
infiltration surface, which can be substituted by a sphere of equivalent surface area in the right; gc is a geometrical coefficient that represents the equivalent flux in the right-
hand figure and is also approximately equal to the actual flux in the left-hand figure.

simulation demonstrates that the gravity force acting solely in the where t is infiltration time; Dh is saturated deficit of soil moisture
vertical direction results in asymmetry of the infiltration process, content; h is the ponded water depth in a single-ring infiltrometer
e.g. a vertically elongate ellipse in Fig 3b. The capped spherical sym- and its initial depth is H0; C is soil suction; K is the vertical hydraulic
metric infiltrated water movement (Fig 2) exists only in the diffu- conductivity.
sion under head pressure of the ponded water in the cylinder and For describing the 3-D infiltration process of a falling head bore-
soil suction that the magnitudes of these forces acting on the wet- hole permeameter (Fig. 1), Philip (1993) further derived a well flow
ting front along any spherical normal direction are equal. Therefore, equation by applying a spherically symmetric Green-Ampt analysis
the capped spherical diffusion equation in the uniform soil can be based on the ‘‘effective hemisphere model’’ for the trickle source
derived only when the gravity force is ignored. For Philip (1993) unsteady infiltration of Ben-Asher et al. (1986):
and Nestingen (2007) methods, the flow velocity at the wetting
front is separated into two components that reflect the gradients  
1 A3  1 3 A1
in the gravitational and the pressure-capillarity forces. However, s¼ 1þ ln 3  ln
they assumed that the gravity components of the flow velocity were
2A A  q3 2A A  q
pffiffiffi     
uniformly distributed across the spherical surface of radius, not so- 3 2q þ A 2þA
þ tan1 pffiffiffi  tan1 pffiffiffi ð2Þ
lely in vertical direction. Moreover, Nestingen (2007) neglected the A 3A 3A
1-D infiltration process of the cylinder inserted into the soil under
the force of gravity proposed by Philip (1992). !
To overcome the above-mentioned problems of the Nestingen Dh R 3
method for the falling head infiltrometer with a hollow cylinder h ¼ H0   r0 ð3Þ
3 r 20
simply inserted into the soil, we derived new equations to describe
one-dimensional infiltration and three-dimensional capped spher-
2 3 3ðCþH0 Þ 3p 2
ical diffusion. The new method, called the modified Nestingen where s ¼ 8K R
p r 0 t; q ¼ r 0 ; A ¼ Dhr0 þ 1 þ 8Dh; R is the soil-wetted
(MN) method, can be used to determine hydraulic parameters bulb radius from the water supply at time t; r0 is the initial R
based on measured depths of the ponded water in the cylinder (=0.5r1); r1 is the borehole radius.
and on the soil moisture deficit during an experiment of the falling For describing the infiltration of the falling head infiltrometer
head permeameter test. with a hollow cylinder inserted into the soil (Fig. 2), Nestingen
(2007) modified the spherically symmetric Green-Ampt analysis
2. Methodology to produce the capped spherical symmetric Green-Ampt analysis
such that:
2.1. The Philip method and Nestingen method
   
L dh p2 RðR þ LÞ dR R r0 þ L
Philip (1992) derived the Green-Ampt (GA) equation for CþhþLþ ¼ Dh  2r 20 ln ð4Þ
K dt 8L K dt r0 R þ L
describing one-dimensional infiltration:

Dh H0  h
t¼  ð1  DhÞ þ ðH0 þ CÞ p 
Kð1  DhÞ2 Dh 2R3 þ 3R2 L  L3  4r 30 Dh ¼ 4pr 20 ðH0  hÞ ð5Þ
  3
H0 þ C
 ln ð1Þ
H0 þ C þ ðH0  hÞ  ð1  DhÞ=Dh where L is depth of ring penetration in the soil.
 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143
Fig. 2. The MPD infiltrometer (modified from Nestingen, 2007). Note: H0 is the
initial height of water level; H(t) is the height of water level at time t; L is the depth
of insertion into the soil; r0 is the equivalent source radius; r1 is the radius of the
cylinder; r is any radius within the wetted front; R is the radius to the sharp wetted
front.
Fig. 3. Photo of the falling head permeameter (a), simulated distribution of soil saturation for a 5 cm penetration depth after one hour infiltration (b). (Note: it was simulated
using VSF for parameters: hydraulic conductivity K = 0.447 cm/min, residual saturation = 0.053, effective porosity = 0.375, a = 0.035/cm and n = 3.18 for the VGM model).
137
2.2. Modified Nestingen (MN) method
2.2.1. Infiltration processes of the ponded water from the single-ring
falling-head permeameter
We developed a simple single-ring falling head permeameter
that can be used to measure the two soil hydraulic parameters K
and C. This device consists of a hollow cylinder that is simply in-
serted into the soil. The declines of the ponded water depth within
a single-ring permeameter are measured by an automatic observa-
tion sensor (HOBOÒ U20 Water Level Logger) during the infiltration
experiment (Fig. 3). The saturated deficit Dh according to the initial
and saturated soil moisture contents are measured by TDR
(6050X1 Trase System) at a depth of 20 cm before and after the
infiltration experiments, respectively. A large ring or disk can be
considered better than a small one because the large ring diameter
is usually designed to reduce the various edge effects related to ra-
dial spreading, blockage of horizontal flow paths, and other phe-
nomena (Nimmo et al., 2009).
Infiltration of the ponded water from the single-ring falling
head permeameter with a hollow cylinder inserted into the soil
usually occurs in two phases (Fig. 4): one-dimensional infiltration
within the inserted depth of the single-ring infiltrometer (Fig. 4b)
and three-dimensional flow beyond the depth (Fig. 4c).
Here, the one-dimensional infiltration along the inserted ring
(H0  h 6 LDh) can be described using the one-dimensional
Green-Ampt model (Eq. (1)). The three-dimensional flow is in-
duced by infiltration under the force of gravity and diffusion under
forces of the ponded water pressure within the single-ring infil-
trometer and soil suction.
2.2.2. 3-D capped spherical diffusion
Once the wetting front of the infiltrated water reaches the in-
serted depth of the soil within the single-ring infiltrometer
(H0  h > LDh), the infiltrated water continuously moves down-
ward in a three-dimensional flow process. It can be separated into
two components: 1-D gravity induced infiltration and 3-D diffu-
sion under the forces of the ponded water pressure within the sin-
gle-ring infiltrometer and soil suction.
In homogeneous and isotropic soils, because the large single-
ring radius is usually larger than the finite insertion depth of the
single-ring, the three-dimensional diffusion can be assumed as a
138 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143

Fig. 4. Schematic of infiltrated water movement in the soil from a single-ring falling head permeameter with a hollow cylinder inserted into the soil.

capped spherical symmetric formation (Fig. 4c). The source of the The amount of the infiltrated water from the single-ring infil-
infiltrating flow is assumed to be a capped sphere (not a sphere as- trometer during the 3-D process (H0  h  LDh) (LDh is ignored
sumed by Nestingen (2007)) with a capped surface area by Nestingen (2007), see Eq. (5)) is the total of the infiltration by
(2pr0(r0 + L)) equivalent to the bottom circular surface area of the gravity K(t  t0) in vertical direction) and the diffusion amount
cylinder (pr21 ) (Fig. 4c). The equivalent source radius r0 is estimated by the ponded water pressure and soil suction (VDh). In the Nestin-
as: gen method (2007), the gravity forces acting on the wetting front
sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi along any spherical normal direction are considered to be equal
L2 r 21 L at any point. The following equation that describes the relationship
r0 ¼ þ  ð6Þ
4 2 2 between h and R can be obtained as:

where r1 is the single-ring radius. 2R3 þ 3LR2  2r30  3Lr20

h ¼ H0  Kðt  t 0 Þ  LDh  Dh ð12Þ
When the capped spherical diffusion forms a radius of R 3r 21
(Fig. 4c), the diffusion velocity v at the equivalent source radius
r0 can be estimated according to the water balance equation. where t0 is the time of one-dimensional infiltration when
H0  h = LDh. t0 can be obtained from Eq. (1):
Dh dV Dh dV 2Dh dR   
v¼ ¼ ¼ 2 RðR þ LÞ ð7Þ Dh H0 þ C
S0 dt pr 21 dt r1 dt t0 ¼ L  ð1  D hÞ þ ðH 0 þ CÞ  ln
Kð1  DhÞ2 H0 þ C þ L  ð1  DhÞ
where S0 is the capped spherical surface area corresponding to the ð13Þ
radius r0, which is equal to the single-ring area; V is the diffusion
volume, which is equal to ð2R3 þ 3LR2  2r30  3Lr20 Þp=3. Differentiating Eq. (12) with t yields:
Water fluxes from any concentric capped spherical surfaces dh 2RðR þ LÞDh dR
should be equal. Thus, as the capped spherical diffusion reaches  ¼ þK ð14Þ
dt r21 dt
a radius of R, the diffusion velocity vr at any radius r (r0 6 r 6 R)
is calculated by: Substituting Eqs. (10), (12), and (14) into Eq. (11) yields the fol-
lowing differential equations to describe the 3-D diffusion.
v S0 2 Dh dR r 0 ðL þ r 0 Þ 8
vr ¼ ¼ RðR þ LÞ ð8Þ 2R3 þ3LR2 2r3 3Lr 2
Sr r 21 dt rðL þ rÞ >
> H0  0 0 DhLDhKðtt ÞþC
>
< dR 3r2
0

dt
¼  1   
where Sr is the surface area corresponding to the capped spherical p2 r 0 ðLþr0 Þ ln R r0 þL þL
2RðRþLÞDh ð15Þ
>
>
8 L RþL r0 Kr2
radius r. >
:
1

According to Darcy’s law, diffusion potential energy of the soil Rjt¼t0 ¼ r 0

water diffusion P for the capped spherical radius varying from r0 When L approaches to 0, Eq. (15) becomes hemispheric diffu-
to R is: sion as follows:
Z ! Z R 8
R
vr 2Dh dR 1 >
>
2R3 23o DhKðtt ÞþC
P¼ dr ¼ 2
RðR þ LÞ r 0 ðL þ r 0 Þ dr ð9Þ < dR H0
3r2
0

r0 K Kr 1 dt r0 rðL þ rÞ ¼ 1
dt p2 RðRr0 ÞDh ð16Þ
>
>
8 Kr 0

For geometrical simplification, a geometrical coefficient is ap- : Rj ¼ r0

t¼t 0
plied so that the actual infiltration surface (a wetted disk that
evolves toward a quasi-spherical bulb) is approximated by a Substituting Eq. (15) into Eq. (14), one can obtain soil suction C
sphere of equivalent surface area (Philip, 1993). We can derive such that
the diffusion potential energy P when the infiltration water flows      
p2 r0 ðL þ r0 Þ R r0 þ L  dh 
from the tube to the actual soil water wetting front: C¼ ln þ L  1 h
 ð17Þ
8 L R þ L r0 Kdt
 
p 2RðR þ LÞDh dR r0 ðL þ r0 Þ
2
R r0 þ L
P¼ ln ð10Þ
8 Kr 21 dt L R þ L r0 2.2.3. Computational procedures for calibrating K and C
Potential energy P consists of two components: the ponded During the infiltration experiments using the falling head infil-
water pressure at the bottom of the inserted single-ring, including trometer with a hollow cylinder that is vertically inserted into the
water depth (h + L) and Darcy’s law head loss KL dh (Nestingen, soil, variations of the ponded water depth h in the single-ring per-
dt
2007), and soil suction C. meameter can be calculated using Eqs. (1), (12), and (15); the
solution R in Eq. (15) can be obtained using a variable-order
L dh Adams–Bashforth–Moulton PECE solver (Shampine and Gordon,
P ¼hþLþ þC ð11Þ
K dt 1975). As the declines of the ponded water depth within a
 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143 139

a b
Fig. 5. Computational flow chart of the MN method.

Table 1 recorded and the capped spherical diffusion radius Rend is calcu-
Hydraulic parameters of three typical soils (Carsel and Parrish, 1988). lated from Eq. (12). Then, a falling head series {hi} corresponding
Soil types a (1/cm) n hr hs h0 C (cm) K (cm/d)
to a time series {ti} is calculated by Eq. (1) for the first phase of
1-D infiltration and by substituting Eq. (15) into Eq. (12) for the
Sand 0.145 2.68 0.105 0.43 0.3 3.98 712.8
Sandy loam 0.075 1.89 0.159 0.41 0.3 5.72 106.1
second phase of 3-D capped spherical diffusion. Finally, differences
Loam 0.036 1.56 0.181 0.43 0.3 7.69 24.96 between the calculated head series {hi} and the measured head ser-
Clay loam 0.019 1.31 0.231 0.41 0.3 7.50 6.24 ies {Hi} are obtained, and the minimum value of khi  Hi k can be
Note: hs is the saturated water content, h0 is the initial saturation, hr is the residual
optimized by adjusting K using the nonlinear least squares method
saturation, C is soil suction, and K is the vertical hydraulic conductivity. (Seber and Wild, 1989). The computation is executed by a program
we developed on a Matlab platform.

single-ring permeameter are measured during the infiltration
experiment, parameters K and C can be optimized on the basis of
objective of minimum error between the measured and simulated
water depths in the single-ring by using the nonlinear least squares
method (Seber and Wild, 1989).
The optimization procedures are shown in Fig. 5. Firstly, r0 is
calculated from Eq. (6) based on the known permeameter variables
r1 and L (shown in Fig. 4b); the saturated deficit Dh is the difference
between the initial and saturated soil moisture contents measured
by TDR before and after the infiltration experiments, respectively;
dh/dt is approximated by the average value of Dh/Dt|end according
to variations of the ponded water depth measured near the exper-
iment end because values of hend and dh/dt|end during the period
are relatively steady. Secondly, K and C are solved by an iterative
method. As K is assumed as a specific value, C is calculated by
the iterative method shown in Fig. 5b once the experiment ending
time tend and corresponding depth of the ponded water hend are
3. Verification and application of the MN method
3.1. Verification of MN based on numerical simulation of the falling
head series
Carsel and Parrish (1988) summarized soil hydraulic parame-
ters of 12 typical soils from a large number of measured data.
Among them, hydraulic parameters of four typical soils (sand, san-
dy loam, loam, and clay loam) are selected for validation of the new
method (Table 1). Here, the initial saturation deficit is assumed to
be 30%.
The infiltration of the ponded water within the cylinder into the
unsaturated zone can be simulated using a three-dimensional
Richards equation. The simulation was performed using the
three-dimensional finite-difference ground-water model (MOD-
FLOW) with variably saturated flow (VSF-MODFLOW) developed
by US Geological Survey (USGS) (Thoms et al., 2006).
140 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143

Table 2
Calibrated parameters K and C based on water depth from numerical simulation by VSF-MODFLOW.

Soil types Carsel and Parrish MN Nestingen GA

C (cm) K (cm/d) C (cm) K (cm/d) C (cm) K (cm/d) C (cm) K (cm/d)
Sand 3.98 712.8 1.2 732.5 0 929.3 2.57 881.7
Sandy loam 5.72 106.1 2.07 104.7 0 137.1 6.22 121.0
Loam 7.69 24.96 2.19 25.62 0 32.16 10.68 26.08
Clay loam 7.50 6.24 1.71 6.32 0 7.29 11.54 6.87

In VSF-MODFLOW, the nonhysteretic (singular) van Genuch-
ten–Mualem soil characteristic functions (VGM) (van Genuchten,
1980) are used. The soil suction can be estimated as shown below
(Bouwer, 1964).
Z Z
0 0
f1  ðauÞn1 ½1 þ ðauÞn m g2
C¼ kðuÞdu ¼
u0 u0 ½1 þ ðauÞn m=2
where u is the pressure head; k(u) is the relative hydraulic conduc-
tivity; a, n and m (=1  1/n) are the VGM model parameters.
Using hydraulic parameters of the four types of soils given by
Carsel and Parrish (1988) (Table 1), VSF simulated the declines of
the ponded water in the single-ring permeameter. The numerically
simulated water depth or water head series in the cylinder is then
used as the optimization objective for the inverse computation
(calibration) of the soil hydraulic parameters in the new model.
For a comparison, we also calibrated the hydraulic parameters
for the 1-D Green-Ampt (GA) method (Philip, 1992) and the Nes-
tingen method (Nestingen, 2007).
If the infiltrated flow coming out of the lower end of the in-
serted cylinder is assumed to be symmetric (Fig. 4), the three-
dimensional flow in the soil can be simplified as two-dimensional
flow in the horizontal and vertical directions. The influence range
of the infiltrated water from the single-ring permeameter fully
filled with water is initially estimated to be within 70 cm both in
the horizontal and vertical directions of the soil for the designed
single-ring permeameter with a hollow cylinder of 15 cm in radius
and 20 cm in height. The modeled area is divided into 176 rows
and 175 columns for the numerical simulations.
If the inserted depth of the single-ring permeameter in the soil
is assumed to be 5 cm, the initial depth of the ponded water will be
15 cm. The Lake package of VSF-MODFLOW was used to simulate
decline of the ponded water depth in the cylinder. The model pro-
duces a series of the ponded water depths with a time interval of
30 s for a time period from the time when the cylinder is fully filled
with water to the time when the cylinder is fully drained.
In the parameter estimation, the simulated series of the ponded
water depths was used as a calibration target. The calibrated re-
sults of C and K for the MN, the GA and the Nestingen methods
are listed in Table 2. Compared with soil hydraulic parameters gi-
ven by Carsel and Parrish (1988) in Table 2, the vertical saturated
hydraulic conductivity calculated by the MN method is more accu-
rate than that using the GA and the Nestingen methods. The values
of K for the GA and the Nestingen methods are larger than those for
the MN method because the GA method neglects the horizontal
movement of the infiltrated water and the Nestingen method ne-
glects the 1-D infiltration of the water in the soil contained by
the inserted part of the cylinder. However, calibrated values of C
for the two methods significantly deviated from the values given
by Carsel and Parrish (1988). The large deviations of C values for
these three methods primarily result from the assumption that
the van Genuchten–Mualem soil characteristic functions (VGM)
are simplified as a pulse function (d function) (Philip, 1966).
du ð18Þ
3.2. Sensitivity and uncertainty analysis
Uncertainty of the calibrated parameters may be produced from
measurement errors of observed ponded water heads H and soil
moisture contents h which influence head changes dh/dt and soil
moisture deficit Dh. We also like to know how the inserted depths
L and anisotropy of soil hydraulic conductivity influence the cali-
brated values of parameters K and C. Table 3 lists simulated results
of changes of the optimized parameters REK and REC under scenar-
ios of possible errors of measured H, Dh and dh/dt, and changes of
soil anisotropy Kh/Kv and soil suction C. The fluctuation of the
ponded heads H due to measurement errors is simulated with
the random function of white noise in a mean square error of
0.002 m (corresponding to 0.002 m resolution of HOBO U20). The
anisotropy of soil hydraulic conductivity is expressed as Kh/
Kv = 10 and 50 (Kh and Kv are horizontal and vertical hydraulic con-
ductivity, respectively). Changes of other variables L, Dh and dh/dt
are set to be within 10% to 10%.
The results in Table 3 show that changes of the ponded head dh/
dt are the most sensitive to the two optimized parameters K and C.
Ten percentage changes in dh/dt may produce 20.02% to 8.27%
differences in hydraulic conductivity K values and 100.00% to
336.11% differences in soil suction C values. Ten percent measure-
ment errors of L and Dh produce about 5% changes in K and 31–43%
changes in C. A small noise of the ponded head H produces 4.23%
change in K and 55.19% change in C. Soil anisotropy of Kh/Kv pro-
duces 7.92% and 8.53% changes in K values and 72.5% and 242.5%
changes in C values when Kh/Kv varies from 1 to 10 and 50,
respectively.
The results show that C has a high degree of uncertainty. How-
ever, a larger error in C value has less influence on determination of
K value. A 10% increase and decrease of C values only produce
0.78% and 0.74% changes in K values.
3.3. Application of the MN method for the single-ring falling head
infiltration
3.3.1. Experiment in the laboratory troughs
Two infiltration experiments using the single-ring infiltrometer
falling-head technique were executed in a variable slope soil

Table 3
The sensitivity and uncertainty analysis of the two parameters K and C for the MN model.

Parameters H 0.002 m SE L Dh dh/dt C Kh/Kv

10% 10% 10% 10% 10% 10% 10% 10% 10 50
REK (%) 4.23 4.25 4.15 5.16 4.91 8.27 20.02 0.78 0.74 7.92 8.53
REC (%) 55.19 33.38 31.83 41.14 42.54 100.00 336.11 – – 72.5 242.5

Note: REK and REC are relative changes of hydraulic conductivity K and soil sorption C, respectively. SE refers to the mean square error.
 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143 141

Table 4
Physical properties of soils and calibrated parameters from single-ring infiltrometer falling-head experiments in the laboratory troughs.

Soil Soil particle size (%) Bulk density (g/cm3) hs h0 Calibrated parameters Soil core estimate
<0.005 mm 0.005–0.05 mm 0.05–0.1 mm 0.1–2 mm C (cm) K (cm/d) log(K) K (cm/d)
Sandy loam 7.1 16.4 62.4 14.1 1.4 0.40 0.217 87.55 27.38 1.437 29.32
Silty loam 13.4 49.7 20.3 16.6 1.4 0.52 0.289 94.54 12.85 1.109 –

16 Sandy loam

Measured
12
Water depth (cm)

Simulated
8

0
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000
Time (second)

16 Silty loam
Measured
Water depth (cm)

12 Simulated

0
0 2000 4000 6000 8000 10000
Time (second)

Fig. 6. Comparison of the measured and simulated water depths in the single-ring.

trough and a large soil trough in the State Key Laboratory of
Hydrology, Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering at Hohai
University, China. The container of the variable slope soil trough
was 12 m in length, 1.5 m in width and 1.5 m in height. The trough
was filled with dried and sieved sandy loam collected from the
plain area of the downstream Yangtze River in 2004. The large soil
trough was 10 m in length, 3.3 m in width and 2.2 m in height. It
was filled with dried and sieved silt loam in 2007. Sediments in
both troughs have been subjected to simulate rainfall–runoff
experiments in the laboratory and thus the soils in the troughs
have become compacted close to their field conditions. The compo-
sitions of the two soils were analyzed using an automatic laser par-
ticle size analyzer (LS13320) (Table 4).
Two hollow cylinders with diameters of 30 cm and 50 cm were
designed for the experiments conducted in a variable slope soil
trough and a large trough, respectively. The height for each of
the two hollow cylinders was 20 cm. The cylinders with diameters
of 30 cm and 50 cm were inserted into soil at depths of 5 cm and
3 cm, respectively.
Besides the hollow cylinders, other simple instruments for the
single-ring infiltrometer falling-head experiments include a TDR
for measuring initial and saturated soil moisture contents (h0 and
hs), and a water level logger (HOBO U20) automatically recording
the ponded water depth (Fig. 3).
The simulated and measured series of the ponded heads for the
two experiments are shown in Fig. 6. They are used as calibration
objectives for determining vertical hydraulic conductivity K and
soil suction C shown in Table 4 using the MN method. The cali-
brated values of K are 27.38 cm/d for sandy loam and 12.85 cm/d
for silty loam. According to experimental results of hydraulic con-
ductivity for 12 typical soils given by Schaap and Leij (1998),
logarithmic K values for sandy loam and silt loam soils are
1.58 ± 0.66 (cm/d) and 1.26 ± 0.74 (cm/d), respectively. Our cali-
brated results are compatible to those in Schaap and Leij (1998).
The calibrated K of 27.38 cm/d for sandy loam is much closer to
the measured value of 29.32 cm/d by using permeameter test on
a sediment column as described by Chen et al. (2008) (Table 4),
indicating that application of the MN method for determining
hydraulic conductivity gives reasonable results.
3.3.2. Field experiment on a hillslope
Determination of hydraulic conductivity using the MN method
was further carried out in a typical peak-cluster depression area
of Guzhou catchment (240 5400 –240 5500 N, 1070 5600 –1070 5700 E) in Hua-
njiang County, northwest Guangxi in southwest China (Fig. 7),
which belonged to the Huanjiang Observation and Research Sta-
tion for Karst Ecosystems under the management of the Chinese
Academy of Sciences (CAS). The catchment area is 1.87 km2 and
its elevation ranges from 375 to 816 m above sea level. The study
site has a mean annual temperature of 16.5–20.5 °C, and a mean
annual rainfall of 1389 mm, precipitation occurring mainly from
May to September. The unconsolidated soils have been developed
from limestone, contain scattered rock fragments, and have an
average thickness of 50–80 cm.
Because of the pressure from overpopulation, sloping lands in
the middle and lower parts of hillslope have been cultivated inten-
sively with forest coverage as low as 13%. Analysis of soil samples
from one hillslope demonstrates that soil clay content decreases
but the sand content increases gradually from the lower to upper
part of the hillslope (Table 5). The soil bulk density generally de-
creases upward along hillslope because the soil contains less clay,
becomes looser and has higher porosity from the lower to the
142 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143

Fig. 7. Location of the hillslope and experimental site.

Table 5
Physical properties of soils and gravel contents on the hillslope.

Sampling position Sand (%) Fine sand (%) Clay (%) Bulk density (g/cm3) Gravimetric contents of gravel (%)
Uppermost 80.41 9.25 10.34 0.92 32.04
Middle-uppermost 41.57 33.88 24.56 0.98 22.57
Middle 30.48 22.31 47.22 1.07 20.02
Middle-lowest (left) 18.26 29.46 52.28 1.1 19.49
Middle-lowest (right) 21.51 30.22 48.27 1.01 15.52
Lowest 26.41 22.95 50.63 0.99 18.01

Table 6
The observed parameters in the falling-head experiments and calibrated K and C values on the hillslope in Huanjiang County, southwest China.

Plots Inserted depth Initial soil moisture Saturated soil moisture Initial head, H0 Duration of Soil suction, C Hydraulic
(cm) content h0 content (cm) infiltration (s) (cm) conductivity, K
(cm/min)
MN Guelph
method
1 4.3 0.283 0.520 11.21 260 56.92 0.308 0.251
2 6.0 0.316 0.574 11.15 176 49.86 0.574 0.268
3 3.5 0.172 0.603 12.58 152 52.56 0.520 0.259
4 5.0 0.351 0.555 15.00 208 44.26 0.753 0.292
5 3.5 0.257 0.521 13.12 233 26.69 0.631 0.508
6 3.5 0.231 0.541 8.80 465 39.47 0.162 0.126
7 6.5 0.233 0.601 9.48 77 35.43 1.322 0.636
8 3.0 0.111 0.385 11.92 139 14.27 1.378 0.419
9 5.0 0.251 0.615 13.36 80 26.72 1.976 2.022
10 4.0 0.219 0.487 14.71 80 14.95 3.335 5.976
11 5.5 0.172 0.455 14.26 188 13.21 1.473 1.698
Average – – – – – – 1.130 1.132

upper parts of this hillslope. The soil is mixed with gravels of 5–
20 mm in diameter. The gravimetric gravel contents increase from
bottom to top on hillslope (Table 5). Investigations on the soil
hydraulic conductivity are very important for water resources
and ecosystem management issues in this region covered by karst.
However, the data on soil hydraulic conductivity is scarce. Thus,
our experiments can fill some knowledge gap.
Field experiments at 11 plots from Nos. 1–3 in the lowest hill-
slope to Nos. 10 and 11 in the uppermost part were carried out
using the simple single-ring falling head permeameter (Fig. 3).
 Q. Cheng et al. / Journal of Hydrology 398 (2011) 135–143
For comparison, the model 2800K1 Guelph Permeameter was used
to measure K values at each plot. The Guelph Permeameter is a
constant-head device which operates on the Mariotte siphon prin-
ciple and provides a quick and simple method for simultaneously
determining field saturated hydraulic conductivity, matric flux po-
tential and soil sorptivity in the field (2800KI operating instruc-
tions, 1991).
The observed parameters for determining K are listed in Table 6.
The calibrated K using MN method is between 0.308 and 3.335 cm/
min (Table 6). Upward along the slope, the K value increases as soil
clay contents reduce and sand and gravel contents increase. The
averaged K value is 0.467 cm/min for plots 1–3 located in the low-
est area of the hillslope, and gradually increases upward along the
slope: 0.515 cm/min for plots 4–6, 1.559 cm/min for plots 7–9, and
2.404 cm/min in the uppermost test sites, plots 10 and 11. The
measured K values using the Guelph Permeameter present a simi-
lar pattern. Table 6 shows that K values from both measurements
are in the same order of magnitude but differences between them
exist because of different diameters of the Guelph Permeameter
and the simple single-ring falling-head permeameter, 6 cm vs.
30 cm. The averaged value of K at the 11 plots for both methods
is almost the same but the standard deviation of K values from
the Guelph Permeameter is 1.64, much larger than 0.88 from the
simple single-ring falling-head permeameter. We believe that
measured K from the simple single-ring falling head permeameter
with a larger diameter at these sites, reflecting K variations for a
larger volume of soils along the hillslope, is more representative
than that from the Guelph Permeameter at the same sites.
4. Conclusions
This article provided new equations and established a simple
single-ring infiltration instrument for determining soil hydraulic
parameters. We derived equations that describe a more complete
water infiltration process in top soils and can reflect more realistic
hydrodynamic conditions, compared with the simplified 1-D
Green-Ampt method and the 3-D Nestingen method. For a sin-
gle-ring inserted a short depth into the soil, we consider that the
infiltrated water movement consists of two phases: 1-D infiltration
along the inserted ring (ignored by Nestingen (2007)) and 3-D flow
beyond the depth (ignored by Philip (1992). We improved 3-D dif-
fusion of the Nestingen method (2007) by considering that the
forces that control 3-D flow can be separated into: (1) the forces
under the ponded water flow within the single-ring infiltrometer
and soil suction to produce 3D diffusion, and (2) the force of gravity
to produce 1-D infiltration in the vertical direction.
The MN method was verified by comparison of numerical sim-
ulation of unsaturated zone flow by using VSF-MODFLOW. The re-
sults demonstrate that the vertical hydraulic conductivity
determined by the MN method is more accurate than those from
both the 1-D Green-Ampt (GA) method and the 3-D Nestingen
method. Neglecting the horizontal movement of the infiltrated
water (e.g. the GA method) and the 1-D infiltration of the water
in the soil (e.g. the Nestingen method) overestimates K values.
Application of the MN method in two soil troughs and on a field
hillsope demonstrates that hydraulic conductivities determined
by the MN method are reasonable. Because the designed instru-
ment is simple and reliable, we expect this method can be applied
to collect soil hydraulic conductivity data sets in a large field.
Acknowledgments
This research was supported by the Key Project of Chinese Min-
istry of Education (No. 308012), National Natural Science Founda-
tion of China (No. 40930635, and 51079038), Programme of
Introducing Talents of Discipline to Universities (No. B08048), The
143
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities,China
(No. 2009B07014) and Program for Changjiang Scholars and Inno-
vative Research Team in University, China. Thanks to the editor
and two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments
on the earlier manuscript.
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