Papers Published

1. Wilson, James F. and Callis, Eric G., The dynamics of loosely jointed structures, International Journal of Non-Linear Mechanics, vol. 39 no. 3 (2004), pp. 503 - 514 [S0020-7462(02)00219-6] .
   (last updated on 2007/04/09)

   Abstract:
   Loosely jointed structures have joint connections that exhibit non-linear lateral force-displacement behavior in bending. Examples include scaffolds, bleachers and other temporary frames. Formulated herein is a lumped parameter, dynamic sway model of a multi-bay, n-story scaffold with bilinear elastic joint connections. Responses are evaluated numerically for an approximate model: a two degree of freedom scaffold in plane sway motion caused by harmonic base excitation. Chaotic, quasi-periodic, and periodic responses are investigated over a practical range of non-dimensional system parameters. The results show that the type of response is especially sensitive to the magnitude of joint damping. © 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

   Keywords:
   Dynamics;Bending strength;Elasticity;Approximation theory;Harmonic analysis;Chaos theory;Scaffolds;