Talk:Water content

message: I notice that the variable used to indicate gravimetric water content is "u".  I am curious to know in what field this is the case.  In geotechnical engineering, the common practice in the English speaking world is to use "w".  I do not want to make an unwarranted edit, but at least it should be added to clarify the point (in geotechnical practice, "u" normally denotes the pore water pressure).
It might also be useful to point out, that in the field of geotechnical engineering, when the term water content is used without the terms "gravimetric" or "volumetric" it is invariably assumed to be the gravimetric water content.  This may not be the case in other fields and as such the distinction should be made clear.
Juaninse (talk) 20:04, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Water Content Definition

message: I have corrected the following statement: 
The water table (or more precisely the top of the capillary fringe above the water table) is the dividing line between saturated and unsaturated conditions.
Saturation requires 100% of the pore space to be filled.  Due to the variaton in pore sizes typically available in a soil or aquifer medium, a water content of "1" is not typically achieved throughout the observed capillary fringe. When one observes the fringe moistened by capillary action above the level of free water, one is not observing saturated conditions throughout the material.  Saturation is only occuring in the smallest pores within the moistened fringe. Significant air content is present and increases with distance above the free water depth.  Reading the information at  I see I can look forward to some discussion on this. I have posted my sources at 
Paleorthid 04:28, 12 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Saturation 

message: I propose a change to the geophysical methods section of the site. As far as I know, generally capacitance and FDR sensors are the same thing.   TDR and FDR sensors are two types of dielectric sensors, which measure dielectric permittivity to obtain volumetric water content.  I don't know if this is very clear and I would like to expand upon this.  Also, tensiometers are used to measure water potential rather than water content so I propose that we either have two sections (water potential and water content) or remove tensiometer from the methods section.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Laurenleighb (talk • contribs) 17:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Please, dig in and edit and rearrange! I'm not completely familiar with TDR and FDR technologies, but if you can add any primary or secondary (e.g., Handbook of Hydrology) sources to support the paragraphs, please add them (I can help wikify and format these if needed). Also, I agree that tensiometers don't measure water content; however, anything that is completely saturated has a soil suction of zero (I'm not sure if this is worth mentioning or not). +mt 18:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Methods Corrections

message: The unit for gravimetric and volumetric water content is %. Does anyone know how to convert % into mm?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Orthoklas (talk • contribs) 08:13, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: This article is about a ratio. You are probably looking for something similar, but certainly different. +mt 03:01, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  unit convertion 

message: Hi all.  When defining residual water content, I see that h is not defined:  "\theta_r is the residual water content, defined as the water content for which the gradient d\theta/dh becomes zero." It would be nice to denifine the term for someone with no background knowledge.   Maybe something like this:  "\theta_r is the residual water content, defined as the water content for which the gradient d\theta/dh becomes zero (where h = pressure head)."  Also maybe link to the pressure head article? Unfortunately I do not have enough of a background to distiguish hydraulic head vs pressure head wiki articles.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ssdesv (talk • contribs) 15:44, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Defining terms 

message: The average reader will be flummoxed by the wording of the article's first paragraph. Water content is not an esoteric subject; therefore, this phrase ought to be reworded so as not to repel readers:
:::"...is expressed as a ratio, which can range from 0 (completely dry) to the value of the material's porosity at saturation."
If water content is a ratio, then it requires two different numbers in order to be calculated. "the value of the material's porosity at saturation" may be a ratio, but, by calling something a ratio, the two entities being compared by the ratio ought to be mentioned. Can anyone fix this? I am not qualified to do it.--Quisqualis (talk) 00:02, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lead paragraph wording 

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thread_title:  External links modified (January 2018) 

message: Dimensionless_quantity reads: Moisture content may be defined as a ratio of volumes (volumetric moisture, m3⋅m−3, dimension L3⋅L−3) or as a ratio of masses (gravimetric moisture, units kg⋅kg−1, dimension M⋅M−1); both would be unitless quantities, but of different dimension. --Backinstadiums (talk) 17:18, 14 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  unitless quantity