Static and vibration characteristics of thin-walled box beams: an experimental investigation

Abstract

Static and vibration characteristics of thin-walled straight and curved box beams were investigated experimentally. Three different beam configurations were considered for the tests: one straight and two curved box beams. The load was applied at the centroid of the box section for the straight and one curved beam specimens. However, for the other curved specimen, the load was applied eccentrically to investigate its behavior under the additional torsion induced by the eccentricity. Displacements and strains were obtained using linear variable displacement transducer, one-directional and rosette strain gages. The specimens were excited using an impact at their free ends. The time history of strains was obtained to calculate natural frequencies and damping ratios. The experiment results were compared with those obtained from three-dimensional finite element analysis for all cases. The results obtained from implementing tests on the straight specimen were also used to validate an efficient numerical method recently developed by the authors.