Abstract
The problem of the reliability of capillary-barriers modelling is studied making use of tipping trough measurements. In its rst part, the article describes laboratory mea-surements of saturated hydraulic conductivities and retention curves of four materials of two di erent capillary barriers.
Both the main branches of the retention curves were measured and the unsaturated hydraulic conductivities and capacity functions were determined. The second part of the article describes numerical modelling of two tipping trough experiments.
The obtained results are compared with the measured data. The comparison shows a good agreement that is presented and discussed.
It is concluded that, in the case of capillary barrier materials, the laboratory measurements made on samples and the subsequent mathematical modelling can substitute for the tipping trough experiments.