Introduction

1.1.

Strength of materials In all engineering construction physical dimensions must be assigned to the component parts. Such parts must be properly dimensioned to resist under the action of the external forces. Thus, the floors of a building must be sufficiently strong for their intended purpose; the shaft of a machine must be of adequate size to carry the required torque; the walls of a pressure vessel must be of adequate strength to withstand the internal pressure and so forth. Likewise, the parts of a composite structure may be rigid enough but may deflect excessively yet. In engineering practice, such requirements must be met with minimum expenditure of a given material. The subject of the Strength of materials involves analytical methods for determining the strength, stiffness (deformation characteristics) and stability of the various load-carrying members. 1.2. Bodies classification There are three important classes of bodies: Bars represent those bodies whose dimensions of the cross section are much smaller than the third dimension the length. Depending on the type of the external load a bar is called: member, rod in case of the axial loads; beam if the bar is subjected to bending; shaft if the member is subjected to torsion or columns if the bar is subjected to the compressive loading. A bar is defined by cross section and bar axis. Considering the shape of the bar axis we may have straight bars or curved bars. The cross section of a bar may be constant or variable. The cross section of a bar may have different geometric shapes as shown in the figure below.

square cross section

rectangular cross section

circular cross section

annular cross section

I - Shapes

U - Shapes

T Shapes

Angles

Plates represent those bodies whose thickness is much smaller than the other two dimensions. Plate is defined by thickness and midsurface. Bocks represent those bodies whose dimensions are of the same size order. 1.3. Diagrammatic conventions for supports It is known that a body has six degrees of freedom in case of a spatial loading (three displacements and three rotations about the three axes of an arbitrary coordinate system). It has only three degrees of freedom in case of a plane loading: the displacements about two perpendicular directions located in the plane of loading and rotation about the third direction perpendicular to the plane of the loading. To cancel some of or all of degrees of freedom, supports are used as mechanical connections between a body and surrounding environment. To minimize the chances of making mistakes it is imperative to adopt schematic representations for the supports when we study mechanical behaviour of the engineering design parts. Table 1 Reactions

Schematic representation of the supports

Simple support

Pinned support

Fixed support

In case of a plane loading there are three basic types of mechanical supports as shown in table 1: Simple supports - cancel one degree of freedom displacement along a direction perpendicular to the supporting base. In such a support one reaction develops. Pinned supports (pin-connections) - cancel two degrees of freedom displacements along two perpendicular directions at the supporting point. In fact, a pinned support cancels the displacement along any direction of the plane. Hence, in general, the reaction at such a support may have two components about two perpendicular directions (one component is in the horizontal direction while the other one is in the vertical direction, for example). Fixed supports - cancel all degrees of freedom. Therefore, three reactions develop: two resisting forces and a resisting moment). Physically, such a support is obtained by building a beam into a brick wall, casting it into concrete or welding the end of a beam to the main structure. If a structural element is fixed at a certain point, it is usually said that the element is embedded at that point (cantilever). 1.4. Diagrammatic conventions for loading Any part of a machine or structural element is subjected to the external loads. There are two main classes of external loads: forces and moments (couples). Using Interbational System metric units, the forces and moments may be expressed in N and N m, respectively. Considering different criteria there are several specific types of loads: a) Depending on the size of the applying surface area, we may have Concentrated loads Distributed loads which may be uniformly distributed loads or varying loads (linear, parabolic, sinusoidal and so forth). b) Depending on the loads variation in time, we may have: static loads whose values slowly increase from zero up to their nominal values, remaining then constant in time; dynamic loads which are suddenly applied and their values vary in a very short time from zero up to the maximum value (impacts); loads with a periodical variation in time loads with a random variation in time 1.5. Classification of beams

Depending primarily on the kinds of the supports used the beams are classified into several classes as follows: Simply supported beam. In such a case the supports are located at the ends of the beam and the supports used are either simple supports or pinned supports 3

 Cantilever beams. In such a case the beam is fixed at one end and completely free at the other one end. Overhanging beam. If the beam projects beyond a support, the beam is said to have an overhange. Fixed beam. In such a case the beam is embedded at the both ends. Beam fixed at one and simply supported at the other end. For all beams the distance l between supports is called span.

Simply supported beam

Cantilever beam

Overhanging beam

Fixed beam

Beam fixed at one end and simply supported at the other end

1.6.

Calculation of beam reactions

In Strength of Materials all problems which involve beams, will begin with determination of the reactions. It is also meaningful to further classify beams into statically determinate and statically indeterminate beams. If the beam, loaded in a plane, is statically determinate, the number of unknown reactions does not exceed three. These unknowns may always be computed using the equations of static equilibrium. The equilibrium equations represent the mathematical expression of equilibrium for a body or a structural element subjected to external loads (original loads and reactions). In case of plane problems (2D problems) the conditions of equilibrium consist in two equations representing the projections of all forces about two arbitrary perpendicular directions in the plane and one equation representing a summation of moments about an arbitrary point of the plane: 4

Fx = 0; F y = 0; M = 0.