Department of Architecture & Civil Engineering, Unit Catalogue 2006/07

AR40251 Structures 5

Credits: 6

Level: Masters

Semester: 2

Assessment: EX80CW20

Requisites:

Before taking this unit you must take AR30083

Aims:
* To develop the understanding and application of design procedures for various materials (particularly steel and concrete) related to professional codes of practice.
* To cover the effects of vibrations and issues affecting the stability of structures.
Learning Outcomes:
On completion of this unit, students will be able to design prestressed concrete structures, and analyse complex structures in terms of dynamics and stability. The student will also be able to demonstrate:
* a systematic understanding of this knowledge, and a critical awareness of current problems and/or new insights, much of which is at, or informed by, the forefront of this area of professional practice;
* conceptual understanding that enables the student to evaluate critically current practice and new developments, and propose new solutions;
* an ability to deal with complex issues both systematically and creatively, make sound judgements in the absence of complete data, and communicate their conclusions clearly.
Skills:
An ability to design and analyse prestressed concrete structures. An ability to analyse stability and vibrations in complex structures, including plates.
Content:
Prestressed concrete: derivation of losses, elastic and ultimate analysis, partial prestressing, load balancing. Shear and end blocks, bursting. Continuous PSC beams, reactant moments, concordancy, line of pressure. Future design of PSC using fibre composites. Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion. The upper and lower bound theorems. Concrete plasticity, upper-bound flexural and shear analysis, lower-bound strut-and-tie methods. Classical plate theory. Plate buckling and buckling of thin-walled box-beams. Finite element analysis of complete structures. Vibrations of single degree of freedom systems: free vibrations, response to step and sinusoidal loads. Multi degree of freedom systems. Modal analysis for vibrations and buckling of structures; eigenvalues, eigenvectors and othogonality conditions. Damping and geometric stiffness. Lateral vibrations of beams under constant axial load. Discussion of post buckled stability via single degree of freedom models. Lateral torsional buckling of beams.

University | Catalogues for 2006/07