<window wordwrap="true" duration="00:01:53.933" type="Generic" height="240" width="160" bgcolor="white" underline_hyperlinks="true" link="red" extraSpaces="ignore"> <time begin="00:00:00.0"/><clear/> <font face="Arial" size="3" color="black"> <b> <center>The Rapid Sediment Analyzer</center> </b> </font> <time begin="00:00:01.73"/> <br> <font face="Arial" size="2" color="black">The rapid sediment analyzer, or RSA, is a settling tube suitable for the analysis of sand-sized material. <br> <time begin="00:00:09.025"/><clear/> <br> This model is equipped with a differential pressure transducer and calculates a size distribution based on the change in pressure with elapsed time. <br> <time begin="00:00:19.0"/><clear/> <br> Other RSA’s are equipped with balances that can measure changes in weight with time. <br> <time begin="00:00:24.306"/><clear/> <br> <br> <time begin="00:00:27.14"/><clear/> <br> A micro splitter is used to obtain a representative 7 to 8-gram subsample. <br> <time begin="00:00:32.5"/><clear/> <br> The sample is placed in a tablespoon and dampened with water by pipette to prevent trapped intergranular air from impeding the settling process. The sample should then be manually spread into a thinner layer to facilitate rapid disaggregation upon impact with the water surface.<br> <time begin="00:00:53.0"/><clear/> <br> Care must be taken to introduce the entire sample simultaneously into the middle of the settling tube. If the entire sample is not entered simultaneously, the sample will take longer to settle out of suspension and the calculated distribution will be finer than actually present. <br> <time begin="00:01:12.574"/><clear/> <br> If the sample is not entered directly into the center of the tube, density currents may form along the tube wall allowing the sample to settle more rapidly and this results in a calculated distribution that is coarser than actually present. <br> <time begin="00:01:27.532"/><clear/> <br> <br> <time begin="00:01:30.3"/><clear/> <br> The sand grains settle according to Stoke’s Law; pressure decreases as the grains settle past the lower transducer port. The analog signal from the transducer is amplified and logged on a computer equipped with an analog- to-digital converter. A typical analysis time is approximately 2 minutes. <br> </font> </window>