Book Overview
Structural analysis is conducted during the preliminary design of civil structures, such as bridges airplanes, to ensure their feasibility. Once the outline design is complete, the structure is analyzed in detail to assess its strength and stiffness. This procedure, structural analysis, is therefore inextricably bound up with structural design. It is one of the tools that the designer uses to ensure economy and safety of the final structure. Of the many different ways in which computer technology has affected the engineering profession, it is in the field of structural analysis that the impact has been most profound. The computer's ability to handle vast amounts of arithmetic with speed and accuracy has made computationally intensive methods viable. This book offers an overview of this critical field. The authors use short computer programs to perform each of the standard procedures used in commercial structural analysis programs. The programs are written in BASIC and are designed to run on any computer from a desktop microcomputer to a mainframe machine. Each program is clear and complete in itself. Also presented are a number of structural analysis programs for a number of different framework types. This second edition illustrates the simplicity and flexibility of the stiffness method by considering problems in the field of structural dynamics. The text is designed for students and professionals in civil, mechanical, structural, and aeronautical engineering.
