Understanding Structural Analysis

by David M. Brohn

It is now the view of many experienced engineers that the newly qualified graduate will not have the opportunity that they did to develop a robust and reliable understanding of structural behaviour. The first four chapters address the development of an understanding of structural behaviour and the remainder of the text shows how that understanding may be used to develop various methods of analysis. The format of the book is unique in that the text is exactly matched by a coherent diagrammatic explanation that serves to amplify, at each stage, the structural behaviour. But without the computer many of our most impressive modern structures could not be built. This skill of understanding structural behaviour is the alphabet and grammar of an approach that will help the young engineer to arrive at an approximate analysis in order to size the structure and provide an external check on the results of the computer analysis. The risk of the misuse of computer systems is now all too evident. This is taken from the IStructE SCOSS report 614: "A new 8-storey residential concrete frame building is being constructed and several columns have been omitted from the ground and first floor level drawings. Without the columns, a 225mm thick RC slab was being asked to span up to 14 meters. Some of the missing columns were spotted by the concrete frame company's project manager." The computer software included was developed by the author and will provide a valuable aid at various stages in the book. This book is the bridge between the classical approach to the teaching of structural analysis and a design office that will rarely see the analysis of a structure by hand. 'The computer has come to stay, we must live with it and this book teaches us how to do so whilst remaining masters of the proceedings' Sir Ove Arup. Introduction to the first edition.

244 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2005

Reviews

[Edward Adeoti Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lot of my frustrations about structural engineering right from my university days were because I couldn’t find a lot of structural deformations intuitive. This book has given me the most intuitive set of rules to predict basic structural behaviour— Reaction, Tension side/face & Moments. The quiz though… had to unlearn a whole lot.

[Bhathiya Thilakarathna]

I think this book will be truly helpful for my structure subject.