Civil Engineering Association

One of the main goals of a good and effective structural design is to decrease, as far as possible, the self-weight of structures, because they must carry the service load. This is especially important for reinforced concrete (RC) structures, as the self-weight of the material is substantial. For RC structures it is furthermore important that the whole structure or most of the structural elements are under compression with small eccentricities. Continuous spatial concrete structures satisfy the above-mentioned requirements. It is shown in this book that a span of a spatial structure is practically independent of its thickness and is a function of its geometry. It is also important to define which structure can be called a spatial one. Such a definition is given in the book and based on this definition, five types of spatial concrete structures were selected: translation shells with positive Gaussian curvature, long convex cylindrical shells, hyperbolic paraboloid shells, domes, and long folders.

To demonstrate the complex research, results of experimental, analytical, and numerical evaluation of a real RC dome are presented and discussed. The book is suitable for structural engineers, students, researchers and faculty members at universities.

For the first time a defi nition of a shell structure is given and the difference between shells and other kinds of structures (linear or plane ones) is emphasized. Additionally, in the frame of this book, the problem of buckling in case of simultaneous physical and geometrical shell nonlinearity is considered as one of possible limit states of the structure. Recommendations for selecting initial dimensions for load bearing elements of a spatial structure (thickness, rise, edge elements section, ties, openings, etc.) are given as well. These recommendations are very important during the early design stages of the shell.

Computer-based design that is widely used in recent decades provides information on how the structure behaves, but do not explain the reason of such behavior. Therefore, results of such calculations cannot be used for other structures and in any other case new analysis should be carried out. Analytical methods are more universal and visual. They allow obtaining the critical load at early design stages. Therefore, the book is focused on analytical and experimental approaches.

The shells discussed in this work are mainly covering structures subjected to self-weight loads. Therefore, these shells are thin-walled and shallow, signifi cantly decreasing their mass and making the construction easier. Most shells described in this book are convex at least in one direction. Therefore, they are mainly in compression, which is optimal for applying thin-walled RC shells.

The book includes numerical examples on surface geometry and calculation of many various typical shells, based on analytical methods. Different types of shell structures and their edge elements are presented, including those, constructed in the recent years.