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I have a wall that forms a circle around a pond. It is 3 bricks high and 10 ft in diameter. It is made of bricks that weight 20 pounds.

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If I then increase the circumference, so the diameter is now 40 ft across, but other parameters are the same, such as the height, type of building materials, etc., will that now be exerting a much higher amount of pressure against the walls? If the circumference is too much, would that wall eventually fail? If so, how do I calculate whether the brick wall comprising 20 pound bricks is strong enough to hold this new amount of water?

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  • $\begingroup$ have you got your anser? $\endgroup$
    – crabNebula
    Aug 30, 2020 at 20:57

2 Answers 2

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Water pressure increases with depth, not width. If the depth of the pond remains the same then the pressure per square inch on the walls will not change no matter what the circumference of the pond.

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will that now be exerting a much higher amount of pressure against the walls?

NO average pressure on the wall only depends upon the height of water surface from the bottom.

If so, how do I calculate whether the brick wall comprising 20 pound bricks is strong enough to hold this new amount of water

you can calculate this by taking into account the toppling condition at point B in picture.

I have SOlved it.

enter image description here

I have not explicitly did the calculation using values

as, calculated it turns out that the force depends on the radius, but pressure doesn't.

but if you make the pool larger, yes it can break more frequently. as force and hence torque is dependent on R (radius).

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