The influence of cable sliding on the deployment of foldable cable-strut structures was studied in this paper. In order to develop an effective program for the cable sliding program, two-node cable element based on the analytical solution of elastic cate- nary was studied. Then the cable sliding stiffness was defined as the ratio of the variation of the cable force to the variation of the cable length. To validate the proposed numerical method, analyses of two examples given in references were carried out. The results show that the method given in this paper is accurate and effective, which can be used to model the cable sliding in cable structures. Finally, the deployment process of a foldable cable-strut structure, which is composed of four-bar linkages and cables, was discussed. It can be found that the effect of cable sliding on the behavior of cable-strut structures is significant. The length changes of active cables are smaller when the cable sliding is considered. Moreover, the nodal coordinate changes also become faster when the numerical model is with cable sliding.
A shelter system based on cable-strut structures,consisting of compressive struts and high-tensile elements,is described in this paper.The deployment of the shelter is achieved by tightening inclined cables.Lower cables are used to terminate the deployment.The state of self-stress of the cable-strut structures in the fully deployed configuration is given,and the minimum strut length and the maximum load design of the shelter are discussed.The mechanical behavior of the system was studied under symmetrical and asymmetrical load cases.The results show that the shelter in the deployed configuration satisfies the ultimate limit and the serviceability limit state conditions.Finally,the stability of the cable-strut system is investigated,considering the effect of imperfections on the buckling of the shelter.We conclude that the influence of imperfections based on the consistent imperfection mode method is not significant.
Jian-guo CAI1,2,Ya ZHOU1,Jian FENG1,2,Yi-xiang XU3 (1Key Laboratory of C&PC Structures of Ministry of Education,Southeast University,Nanjing 210096,China) (2National Prestress Engineering Research Center,Southeast University,Nanjing 210096,China) (3Department of Civil Engineering,Strathclyde University,Glasgow,UK)
