July 15, 2024
Virtual Flume
Ven Te Chow’s book “Open Channel Hydraulics” is arguably the gold-standard book for hydraulic engineers-especially those of us who model open channel flow.
HEC-RAS 6.0 beta 2 is now available!
The beta 2 release of HEC-RAS 6.0 is now available. This fixes the bug with 2D bridges in SI models. See below message from HEC for more info:
We have released another beta version, which is now available from our website. Several bugs have been fixed from the previous version. I have enclosed a PDF file that describes all the Know Issues, most of which were fixed. However, a few issues have not been fixed yet, but will be for a future Beta release.
Here is the link to the HEC-RAS 6.0.0 Beta 2 download area of our webpage, this version will automatically uninstall the previous version for you:
Here is the link to the new HEC-RAS Online Documentation Page:
Thank you for Testing the HEC-RAS 6.0 Beta software.
More information on the 6.0 beta release can be found in this post: https://therassolution.kleinschmidtgroup.com/ras-post/hec-ras-6-0-beta-is-now-available/
Comments
Ian Sharp
on February 5, 2021Interestingly, the RAS release notes say “Version 6.0 of the River Analysis System (HEC-RAS) is now available. This Version supersedes Version 5.0.7, and all previous versions.” I suspect that is a little premature as we are on Beta Version 2.
Chris Goodell
on February 8, 2021Correct. Use the beta version for testing and training, but better to wait for the official release of 6.0 before using it for a project.
Diana
on February 15, 2021Hi Chris, I’m on the 5.0 version of HEC-RAS and I’m having trouble with my XS labels. I’m trying to create a geometry for the bathymetry but the XS labels are not in a consequential manner and thus are connecting XS that are not next to one another; creating channels where there shouldn’t be any. Any idea on why the river stations numbering are acting this way? I know the label should be the distance between the XS to the downstream of the river, but it seems my XS labels are not following this rule. Appreciate any direction you can nudge me to for a solution.
Chris Goodell
on March 4, 2021The labels are whatever you assign them and are not tied to the actual spacing between cross sections. Unless you created them geospatially with GeoRAS or RAS Mapper. Also, if the cross sections are georeferenced, but the coordinates are wrong, they could be placed in non-sequential order. Check the coordinates of the cross section cutlines and make sure they are correct.
Lana Bayless
on February 26, 2021Chris – I am running the Beta Version 2 to do a fairly simple analysis. I am fairly new to HecRas – so am not sure if this is a bug – or something with my model itself. Could you offer any insight on the following error message:
Plan: ‘Plan 02’ (BPS-Existing2.p02)
Simulation started at: 26Feb2021 10:49:35 AM
Writing Geometry…
E-171st_So: Mesh property tables are current.
E-171_No: Mesh property tables are current.
No-Military: Mesh property tables are current.
W-171_NW: Mesh property tables are current.
W-171_SW: Mesh property tables are current.
W-171_West: Mesh property tables are current.
Completed Writing Geometry
Writing Event Conditions …
Completed Writing Event Condition Data
Steady Flow Simulation HEC-RAS 6.0 Beta
HDF_ERROR trying to use HDF output file
Subroutine HDF_OPEN_LAT
HDF5-DIAG: Error detected in HDF5 (1.8.11) thread 0:
#000: ..\..\src\H5G.c line 285 in H5Gcreate2(): no name
major: Invalid arguments to routine
minor: Bad value
Stored maps were not written because the simulation did not complete.
Computations Summary
Computation Task Time(hh:mm:ss)
Completing Geometry 1
Completing Event Conditions <1
Steady Flow Computations <1
Complete Process 2
Any help you can provide would be appreciated.
Chris Goodell
on March 4, 2021The messages about the mesh property tables implies you have some 2D areas. But there’s also a message saying “Steady Flow Simulation HEC-RAS 6.0 Beta”. That implies you are running a steady flow simulation.
You have to run 2D areas using unsteady flow.
Jimmy
on March 10, 2021It seems the the stage and flow hydrograph function does not work under Beta 6. I also have problem with DSS times series plot when I specify, for example, a flow hydrograph for the upstream XS for unsteady flow. After I run the model in beta 2, but open it in v5.07, both of the above functions work.
Chris Goodell
on March 23, 2021Thanks for letting us know! Would be good to send that to HEC as a bug report.
Jim
on March 23, 2021HEC just released V6 Beta 3 and both of the issues have been fixed from my test run.
Brandon C.
on May 25, 2021Hey Chris,
Thank you for the constant excellent content.
We are working in RAS 6 Beta Update 3 currently with a full 2D model containing a single 2D area, using the rain-on-grid method and diffusion wave equation set. The 2D area has 40+ bridges and 120+ culverts.
We are running into an issue where the model runs for a time with generally good results, but at some point it stops calculating any movement of water. Water surface elevation, flow, and structure hydrographs all “flatline”, so to speak. Further, the “computations” from this point on take about 2.5 times longer than model runs which do not have this error. A model which takes 4 hours to successfully run a 7-day storm event instead takes about 10 hours to finish calculating mostly unusable results. I have not read about anyone else having this issue, but we have 2 teams working on a handful of similar models of other watersheds, and we have all run into this “flatline” error at some point or another in Beta 2 and Beta 3. It seems to be related to 2D Area Connections, as runs without bridges and culverts (i.e. mesh only) do not flatline nor do runs fewer bridges and culverts.
Do you know anything about this or have any suggestions?
Thank again,
Brandon C.
Chris Goodell
on May 27, 2021With 40+ bridges and a 4 to 10 hour run time, this model will be very difficult to troubleshoot. But it sounds like you have some instabilities. Try shortening up your model simulation time as much as possible to troubleshoot. Perhaps you can start it where the trouble begins. Then I would add one or two bridges at a time and see if you can pinpoint which bridge is causing the trouble. Unfortunately, this is going to take some work for you to figure it out.
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