EDEXCEL NATIONAL CERTIFICATE/DIPLOMA

MECHANICAL PRINCIPLES
OUTCOME 2 ENGINEERING COMPONENTS
TUTORIAL 1 STRUCTURAL MEMBERS
2

ENGINEERING COMPONENTS

Structural members: struts and ties; direct stress and strain, dimensional changes;
combined effects of direct and thermal loading, factor of safety.

Compound members: series and parallel connected compound bars made up of two
materials; direct stress and strain in each material, dimensional changes.

Fastenings: shear stress in fastenings e.g. riveted joints, bolted joints and hinge pins
subjected to single and double shearing forces
You should judge your progress by completing the self assessment exercises. These may be sent for
marking at a cost (see home page).
On completion of this tutorial you should be able to do the following.

Define structural members.

Calculate direct stress and strain.

Calculate changes in dimensions.

Solve basic problems involving stress, strain and modulus.

Explain and calculate Safety Factor.

Explain and calculate stresses due to temperature changes.

It is assumed that the student is already familiar with the concepts of FORCE.

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1.

TYPES OF STRUCTURAL MEMBERS

Engineering structures come in many forms. Here are some.

STRUTS AND TIES
A strut is a long thin member that is compressed and usually fails by buckling.
A tie is a member that is stretched so it cannot buckle. A tie could be a rope or chain as well as a
rigid length of material.

Figure 1
FRAMES
Struts and ties make up the members of lattice frames such as the simple one shown. The two side
members are compressed and so are struts but the bottom one is stretched and could be a chain so it
is a tie.

Figure 2
COLUMNS
A column is a thick compression member. Struts fail due to bending but columns fail in
compression. Columns are usually made of brittle material which is strong in compression such as
cast iron, stone and concrete. These materials are weak in tension so it is important to ensure that
bending does not produce tensile stresses in them. If the compressive stress is too big, they fail by
crumbling and cracking

Figure 3

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BEAMS
A beam is a structure, which is loaded transversely (sideways). The loads may be point loads or
uniformly distributed loads (udl). The diagrams show the way that point loads and uniform loads
are illustrated.

Figure 4
Transverse loading causes bending and bending is a very severe form of stressing a structure. The
bent beam goes into tension (stretched) on one side and compression on the other.

Figure 5
2.

DIRECT STRESS

When a force is applied to an elastic body, the body deforms. The way in which the body deforms
depends upon the type of force applied to it. A compression force makes the body shorter. A tensile
force makes the body longer.

Figure 6
Tensile and compressive forces are called DIRECT FORCES.
Stress is the force per unit area upon which it acts.
Stress = = Force/Area N/m2 or Pascals.
The symbol is called SIGMA
NOTE ON UNITS The fundamental unit of stress is 1 N/m2 and this is called a Pascal. This
is a small quantity in most fields of engineering so we use the multiples kPa, MPa and GPa.
Areas may be calculated in mm2 and units of stress in N/mm2 are quite acceptable. Since 1
N/mm2 converts to 1 000 000 N/m2 then it follows that the N/mm2 is the same as a MPa

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3.

DIRECT STRAIN

In each case, a force F produces a deformation x. In engineering we usually change this force into
stress and the deformation into strain and we define these as follows.
Strain is the deformation per unit of the original length

Strain = = x/L

The symbol is called EPSILON

Strain has no units since it is a ratio of length to length. Most engineering materials do not stretch
very much before they become damaged so strain values are very small figures. It is quite normal to
change small numbers in to the exponent for of 10-6. Engineers use the abbreviation (micro
strain) to denote this multiple.
For example a strain of 0.000068 could be written as 68 x 10-6 but engineers would write 68 .
Note that when conducting a British Standard tensile test the symbols for original area are So
and for Length is Lo.
WORKED EXAMPLE No.1
A metal wire is 2.5 mm diameter and 2 m long. A force of 12 N is applied to it and it stretches
0.3 mm. Assume the material is elastic. Determine the following.
i. The stress in the wire .
ii. The strain in the wire .
SOLUTION
d 2 x 2.5 2
A=
=
= 4.909 mm 2
4
4
F
12
= =
= 2.44 N/mm 2
A 4.909

Answer (i) is hence 2.44 MPa

x 0.3 mm
=
= 0.00015 or 150
2000
L

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE No.1

1.

A steel bar is 10 mm diameter and 2 m long. It is stretched with a force of 20 kN and extends
by 0.2 mm. Calculate the stress and strain.
(Answers 254.6 MPa and 100 )

2.

A rod is 0.5 m long and 5 mm diameter. It is stretched 0.06 mm by a force of 3 kN. Calculate
the stress and strain.
(Answers 152.8 MPa and 120)

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4.

MODULUS OF ELASTICITY E

Elastic materials always spring back into shape when

released. They also obey HOOKE'S LAW. This is the law
of a spring which states that deformation is directly
proportional to the force.
F/x = stiffness = k N/m

Figure 7

The stiffness is different for different materials and different sizes of the material. We may
eliminate the size by using stress and strain instead of force and deformation as follows.
If F and x refer to direct stress and strain then
FL
F A
=
=
and
Ax
x L
The stiffness is now in terms of stress and strain only and this constant is called the MODULUS of
ELASTICITY and it has a symbol E.

F = A

x = L hence

E=

FL
=
Ax

A graph of stress against strain will be a straight line with a gradient of E. The units of E are the
same as the units of stress.
6.

ULTIMATE TENSILE STRESS

If a material is stretched until it breaks, the tensile stress has reached the absolute limit and this
stress level is called the ultimate tensile stress. Values for different materials may be found in
various sources such as the web site Matweb.

WORKED EXAMPLE No.2

A steel tensile test specimen has a cross sectional area of 100 mm2 and a gauge length of 50
mm, the gradient of the elastic section is 410 x 103 N/mm. Determine the modulus of elasticity.
SOLUTION
The gradient gives the ratio F/A = and this may be used to find E.
F L
50
E = = x = 410 x 10 3 x
= 205 000 N/mm 2 or 205 000 MPa or 205 GPa
x A
100

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WORKED EXAMPLE No.3

A Steel column is 3 m long and 0.4 m diameter. It carries a load of 50 MN. Given that the
modulus of elasticity is 200 GPa, calculate the compressive stress and strain and determine
how much the column is compressed.
SOLUTION
d 2 x 0.4 2
=
= 0.126 m 2
4
4
F 50 x10 6
= 397.9 x10 6 Pa
= =
A
0.126

397.9 x10 6
= 0.001989
E=
so = =

E
200 x10 9
x
=
so x = L = 0.001989 x 3000 mm = 5.97 mm
L
A=

5.

SAFETY FACTOR

The stress at which a material is deemed to fail might be the ultimate stress or the yield stress. It
might also be some other value based on some other criterion such as fatigue and creep. We should
also bear in mind that the working stress is often higher than that predicted in the theory covered so
far because of local factors such as grooves and sharp corners that raise the stress level. We will not
be studying this here.
The safety factor is the ratio of the maximum stress allowed and the actual stress.
SF = Maximum Allowable Stress/Working Stress

WORKED EXAMPLE No.4

A Steel tie rod is 20 mm diameter. It carries a load of 4 MN. Given that the maximum
allowable stress is 460 MPa, calculate the safety factor.
SOLUTION

d 2 x 0.2 2
=
= 31.4 x 10 3 m 2
4
4
F
4 x10 6
= 127.3 x10 6 Pa
= =
3
A 31.4 x 10
460
= 3.61
SF =
127.3
A=

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SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE No.2

1.

A bar is 500 mm long and is stretched to 505 mm with a force of 50 kN. The bar is 10 mm
diameter. Calculate the stress and strain.
The material has remained within the elastic limit. Determine the modulus of elasticity.
(Answers 636.6 MPa, 0.01 and 63.66 GPa.)

2.

A steel bar is stressed to 280 MPa. The modulus of elasticity is 205 GPa. The bar is 80 mm
diameter and 240 mm long.
Determine the following.
i.
The strain. (0.00136)
ii.
The force. (1.407 MN)

3.

A circular metal column is to support a load of 500 Tonne and it must not compress more than
0.1 mm. The modulus of elasticity is 210 GPa. the column is 2 m long.
Calculate the cross sectional area and the diameter. (0.467 m2 and 0.771 m)
Note 1 Tonne is 1000 kg.

4.

A Steel tie rod is 10 mm diameter. It carries a load of 3 MN. Given that the maximum
allowable stress is 500 MPa, calculate the safety factor.
(Answer 1.31)

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6.

TEMPERATURE STRESSES

It is not clear in the syllabus how much attention should be paid to thermal stresses and perhaps a
description only would suffice. This work should be studied if you think it is required to calculate
thermally induced stresses.
Metals expand when heated. This can be put to good use. For example a ring may be expanded by
warming it and then fitted onto a shaft and on cooling grips the shaft very tightly.
Thermal expansion can also produce unwanted stresses in structures. For example, suddenly
allowing hot fluid into a badly designed pipe could cause it to fracture as it tries to get longer but
is prevented from doing so.
COEFFICIENT OF LINEAR EXPANSION

All engineering materials expand when heated and this expansion is usually equal in all directions.
If a bar of material of length L has its temperature increased by degrees, the increase of length
L is directly proportional to the original length L and to the temperature change . Hence
L =constant x L
The constant of proportionality is called the coefficient of linear expansion ().
L = L
INDUCED STRESS IN A CONSTRAINED BAR

When a material is heated and not allowed to expand freely, stresses are induced which are known
as "temperature stresses." Suppose the bar was allowed to expand freely by distance L and then
changed back to its original length. The strain is then
=L /L = L /L =
Since stress/strain = modulus of elasticity (E) then the induced stress is
= E = E

This may be a tensile stress or a compressive stress depending whether the bar was pulled back to
its original length or pushed back.

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WORKED EXAMPLE No.5

A thin steel band 850 mm diameter must be expanded to fit around a disc 851 mm diameter.
Calculate the temperature change needed and the stress produced in the ring. The coefficient of
linear expansion is 15 x 10-6 per oC and the modulus of elasticity E is 200 GPa.
SOLUTION

Initial circumference of ring = D = x 850 = 2670.35 mm

Required circumference = x 851 = 2673.50 mm
L = 2673.50 - 2670.35 = 3.15 mm
L = L
-6
3.15 = 15 x 10 x 2670.35 x
= 3.15/(15 x 10-6 x 2670.35) = 78.6 Kelvin
= E = 200 x 109 x 15 x 10-6 x 78.6 = 235.8 MPa.
Alternatively
strain = L/ L = 3.15/2670.35 = 0.011796
stress = E = 200 x 109 x 0.011796 = 235.8 MPa

WORKED EXAMPLE No.6

A brass bar is 600 mm long and it is turned on a centre lathe to 100 mm diameter. It is held
between the chuck jaws and a running tail stock so that it is not free to expand. During the
turning process it has become heated from 20 oC to 95oC. Calculate the thermal stress induced
in the bar and the resulting thrust on the chuck and tail stock. E for brass is 90 GPa and is 18
x 10-6 per oC.
SOLUTION

Stress induced = = E = 90 x 109 x 18 x 10-6 x (95 20) = 121.5 MPa

Force = stress x cross sectional area = 121.5 x 106 x x 0.12/4 = 954.3 kN

WORKED EXAMPLE No.7

Determine the induced stress and thrust if the centre lathe flexed so that the bar changed length.
SOLUTION

Check your solution here. The free expansion of the bar is

L = L = 18 x 10-6 x 600 x (95 20) = 0.81 mm
Actual change in length is 0.6 mm.
Strain induced = change in length/original length = (0.81 0.6)/600 = 0.00035
Stress induced = E = 90 x 109 x 0.00035 = 31.5 MPa
Force = stress x cross sectional area = 31.5 x 106 x x 0.012/4 = 247.4 kN

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SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE No.3

1.

A steel ring is 50 mm diameter and 2 mm thick. It must be fitted onto a shaft 50.1 mm
diameter. Calculate the temperature to which it must be heated in order to fit on the shaft. The
initial temperature is 20 oC and the coefficient of linear expansion is 15 x 10-6 per oC.
(Answer 133.3 K)

2. A stub shaft 85.2 mm diameter must be shrunk to 85 mm diameter in order to insert it into a
housing. By how much must the temperature be reduced? Take the coefficient of linear
expansion is 12 x 10-6 per oC.
(Answer -195.6 K)
3. A steam pipe is 120 mm outer diameter and 100 mm inner diameter. It has a length of 30 m and
passes through a wall at both ends where it is rigidly constrained. Steam at 200oC is suddenly
released into the pipe. The initial temperature of the pipe is 15 oC and the coefficient of linear
expansion is 15 x 10-6 per oC. E is 200 GPa.
Calculate
i. the thermal stress produced. (555 MPa)
ii. the force exerted by the pipe against the walls. (1.918 MN)

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