Breakthrough phenomenon during fluids percolating through wet saturated por
ous layer is widely met in the study of heat and mass transfer in porous me
dia. Breakthrough pressure (BP) is a characteristic pressure that indicates
the intrinsic properties of seepage within porous media. Measuring results
of BP for saturated narrow-sieved sand are reported here. The curve of BP
varying with the height of porous layer was obtained. Experiment and analys
is indicate that BP is independent of the height of particle packed layer i
f thick enough; however, when the height is less than a certain critical va
lue, BP diminishes with the decrease of the height according to a universal
scaling law.