the resistances to displacement are the effect of a strained state of the pieces, which strained state is the effect of the load, and when the load is applied the strained state and the resistances produced by it increase until the resistances acquire just those magnitudes which are sufficient to balance the load, after which they increase no further.
This principle of least resistance renders determinate many problems in the statics of structures which were formerly considered indeterminate.
§ 7. Relations between Polygons of Loads and of Resistances.—In a structure in which each piece is supported at two joints only, the well-known laws of statics show that the directions of the gross load on each piece and of the two resistances by which it is supported must lie in one plane, must either be parallel or meet in one point, and must bear to each other, if not parallel, the proportions of the sides of a triangle respectively parallel to their directions, and, if parallel, such proportions that each of the three forces shall be proportional to the distance between the other two,—all the three distances being measured along one direction.
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| Fig. 86. |
Considering, in the first place, the case in which the load and the two resistances by which each piece is balanced meet in one point, which may be called the centre of load, there will be as many such points of intersection, or centres of load, as there are pieces in the structure; and the directions and positions of the resistances or mutual pressures exerted between the pieces will be represented by the sides of a polygon joining those points, as in fig. 86 where P1, P2, P3, P4 represent the centres of load in a structure of four pieces, and the sides of the polygon of resistances P1 P2 P3 P4 represent respectively the directions and positions of the resistances exerted at the joints. Further, at any one of the centres of load let PL represent the magnitude and direction of the gross load, and Pa, Pb the two resistances by which the piece to which that load is applied is supported; then will those three lines be respectively the diagonal and sides of a parallelogram; or, what is the same thing, they will be equal to the three sides of a triangle; and they must be in the same plane, although the sides of the polygon of resistances may be in different planes.
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| Fig. 87. |
According to a well-known principle of statics, because the loads or external pressures P1L1, &c., balance each other, they must be proportional to the sides of a closed polygon drawn respectively parallel to their directions. In fig. 87 construct such a polygon of loads by drawing the lines L1, &c., parallel and proportional to, and joined end to end in the order of, the gross loads on the pieces of the structure. Then from the proportionality and parallelism of the load and the two resistances applied to each piece of the structure to the three sides of a triangle, there results the following theorem (originally due to Rankine):—
If from the angles of the polygon of loads there be drawn lines (R1, R2, &c.), each of which is parallel to the resistance (as P1P2, &c.) exerted at the joint between the pieces to which the two loads represented by the contiguous sides of the polygon of loads (such as L1, L2, &c.) are applied; then will all those lines meet in one point (O), and their lengths, measured from that point to the angles of the polygon, will represent the magnitudes of the resistances to which they are respectively parallel.
When the load on one of the pieces is parallel to the resistances which balance it, the polygon of resistances ceases to be closed, two of the sides becoming parallel to each other and to the load in question, and extending indefinitely. In the polygon of loads the direction of a load sustained by parallel resistances traverses the point O.[1]
§ 8. How the Earth’s Resistance is to be treated . . . When the pressure exerted by a structure on the earth (to which the earth’s resistance is equal and opposite) consists either of one pressure, which is necessarily the resultant of the weight of the structure and of all the other forces applied to it, or of two or more parallel vertical forces, whose amount can be determined at the outset of the investigation, the resistance of the earth can be treated as one or more upward loads applied to the structure. But in other cases the earth is to be treated as one of the pieces of the structure, loaded with a force equal and opposite in direction and position to the resultant of the weight of the structure and of the other pressures applied to it.
§ 9. Partial Polygons of Resistance.—In a structure in which there are pieces supported at more than two joints, let a polygon be constructed of lines connecting the centres of load of any continuous series of pieces. This may be called a partial polygon of resistances. In considering its properties, the load at each centre of load is to be held to include the resistances of those joints which are not comprehended in the partial polygon of resistances, to which the theorem of § 7 will then apply in every respect. By constructing several partial polygons, and computing the relations between the loads and resistances which are determined by the application of that theorem to each of them, with the aid, if necessary, of Moseley’s principle of the least resistance, the whole of the relations amongst the loads and resistances may be found.
§ 10. Line of Pressures—Centres and Line of Resistance.—The line of pressures is a line to which the directions of all the resistances in one polygon are tangents. The centre of resistance at any joint is the point where the line representing the total resistance exerted at that joint intersects the joint. The line of resistance is a line traversing all the centres of resistance of a series of joints,—its form, in the positions intermediate between the actual joints of the structure, being determined by supposing the pieces and their loads to be subdivided by the introduction of intermediate joints ad infinitum, and finding the continuous line, curved or straight, in which the intermediate centres of resistance are all situated, however great their number. The difference between the line of resistance and the line of pressures was first pointed out by Moseley.
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| Fig. 88. |
§ 11.* The principles of the two preceding sections may be illustrated by the consideration of a particular case of a buttress of blocks forming a continuous series of pieces (fig. 88), where aa, bb, cc, dd represent plane joints. Let the centre of pressure C at the first joint aa be known, and also the pressure P acting at C in direction and magnitude. Find R1 the resultant of this pressure, the weight of the block aabb acting through its centre of gravity, and any other external force which may be acting on the block, and produce its line of action to cut the joint bb in C1. C1 is then the centre of pressure for the joint bb, and R1 is the total force acting there. Repeating this process for each block in succession there will be found the centres of pressure C2, C3, &c., and also the resultant pressures R2, R3, &c., acting at these respective centres. The centres of pressure at the joints are also called centres of resistance, and the curve passing through these points is called a line of resistance. Let all the resultants acting at the several centres of resistance be produced until they cut one another in a series of points so as to form an unclosed polygon. This polygon is the partial polygon of resistance. A curve tangential to all the sides of the polygon is the line of pressures.
§ 12. Stability of Position, and Stability of Friction.—The resistances at the several joints having been determined by the principles set forth in §§ 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, not only under the ordinary load of the structure, but under all the variations to which the load is subject as to amount and distribution, the joints are now to be placed and shaped so that the pieces shall not suffer relative displacement under any of those loads. The relative displacement of the two pieces which abut against each other at a joint may take place either
- ↑ Since the relation discussed in § 7 was enunciated by Rankine, an enormous development has taken place in the subject of Graphic Statics, the first comprehensive textbook on the subject being Die Graphische Statik by K. Culmann, published at Zürich in 1866. Many of the graphical methods therein given have now passed into the textbooks usually studied by engineers. One of the most beautiful graphical constructions regularly used by engineers and known as “the method of reciprocal figures” is that for finding the loads supported by the several members of a braced structure, having given a system of external loads. The method was discovered by Clerk Maxwell, and the complete theory is discussed and exemplified in a paper “On Reciprocal Figures, Frames and Diagrams of Forces,” Trans. Roy. Soc. Ed., vol. xxvi. (1870). Professor M. W. Crofton read a paper on “Stress-Diagrams in Warren and Lattice Girders” at the meeting of the Mathematical Society (April 13, 1871), and Professor O. Henrici illustrated the subject by a simple and ingenious notation. The application of the method of reciprocal figures was facilitated by a system of notation published in Economics of Construction in relation to framed Structures, by Robert H. Bow (London, 1873). A notable work on the general subject is that of Luigi Cremona, translated from the Italian by Professor T. H. Beare (Oxford, 1890), and a discussion of the subject of reciprocal figures from the special point of view of the engineering student is given in Vectors and Rotors by Henrici and Turner (London, 1903). See also above under “Theoretical Mechanics,” Part 1. § 5.
