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The Beam Project: The Beam Team

ENES 220 (0101)

Jevon Hart, Savannah Moldvay, Delaney Lloyd, Evan Snodgrass,

Connor Shields, Oksana Mikhaylenko

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Table of Contents

Student Responsibilities …………………………………………………………………………..3

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………..3

Material Property Values…………………………………………………………………………..4

Technical Engineering Drawings………………………………………………………………….5

Shear Force Diagram……………………………………………………………………………...6

Bending Moment Diagram………………………………………………………………………..7

Process for Optimization…………………………………………………………………………..7

Calculations of Failure Loads…………………………………………………………………..…8

Maximum Deflection and Location……………………………………………………………….9

Strength-to-Weight Ratio, Failure Type, Location (Prior to Testing)............................................10

Test Results………………………………………………………………………………………10

Comparison to Prediction………………………………………………………………………...11

Discussion of Results…………………………………………………………………………….12

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………….12

Appendix…………………………………………………………………………………………14
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Student Responsibilities

Jevon Hart I created the technical drawings and V&M diagrams, and I helped
anywhere it was needed, like helping check calculations. Also I helped
assemble the beam.

Savannah Moldvay I wrote out the Material Property Values section of the final beam
report. I wrote out the Calculations of Failure Loads as well as
Maximum Deflection and Location, and Strength-to-Weight Ratio on
my iPad and uploaded them into the document. I also wrote up the
Discussion of Results.

Delaney Lloyd I created a Matlab code that automated the process of determining the
dimension for the beams. My code also calculated the predicted
strength to weight ratio, predicted failure value in shear, normal stress,
and shear of the glue. I helped assemble the beam in the workshop. I
also wrote the Test Result and part of the Process of Optimization
sections on the report.

Evan Snodgrass I helped with the initial design of the beam, and I also did the beam
deformation calculations. For the report I wrote the conclusion
paragraphs, and I proofread through the whole report and made sure it
was free from spelling/grammar errors.

Connor Shields I helped optimize the beam design and checked the MATLAB code. I
also did all the calculations for our predicted failure loads and safety
factors. I wrote part of the optimization process and table of contents
in this report.

Oksana Mikhaylenko I wrote out the introduction for the final beam report as well as the
comparison to our original calculated predictions. I was also involved
in helping out in any place it was needed, such as checking
calculations and helping decide the type of cross-section.

Introduction

Our task was to design a cross-section for a beam that would withstand an applied load of

1000 - 2500 lbs, with a theoretical failure load being within +20% of the failure load. Our beam

test conditions included two roller supports separated by 20 inches, and the applied load located

at 12 inches from the left roller support. We decided to go with an I-beam for our cross-section,

with dimensions including a width of 1.5 inches, depth of 3.36 inches, web thickness of 0.38
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inches, and flange thickness of 0.28 inches. Our beam was constructed out of pine wood and

gorilla glue was used as the adhesive. We chose pine due to its higher strength to weight ratio in

comparison to oak. When deciding on our cross-section, we also considered doing a box-beam

and composite beam. The box-beam design would be weaker than an I-beam, and the composite

beam would be heavier, lowering our strength-to-weight ratio. Ultimately we chose an I-beam

cross section due to its light weight, as well as its resistance to yielding and bending.

Material Property Values

The materials we chose for the beam are pine and gorilla glue.

➢ Tensile Strength Pine = 14,327 psi

○ We used the average tensile strength found in wood properties from ENES 102.

➢ Shear Strength Pine = 1,492 psi

○ We used the average shear strength found in wood properties from ENES 102.

➢ Shear Strength Glue = 989 psi

○ We used the average Shear Strength of Gorilla on Pine found in glue properties

from ENES 102.

Our team chose the averages as we felt it would be the best representation of the Tensile Strength

of Pine, Shear Strength of Pine, and Shear Strength of Glue. We also wanted to be consistent

with our material property values. Therefore, we also chose to stick with the averages for each.
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Technical Engineering Drawings

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Since the beam had to support a load between 1000 lb to 2500 lb, we designed our beam
to support 2000 lb. We decided to base our calculations on this value because it is within range,
but it’s slightly closer to the maximum limit. We knew that wood was unpredictable and it may
have imperfections, which can lead to failure early. So, we chose a conservative value.

We summed the moments about the left side and summed the forces in the y-direction in
order to get the reaction forces by the supports. As seen above, we calculated that the left and
right reaction forces were 800lb and 1200 lb, respectively.

Shear Force Diagram

The max shear force is 1200lb

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Bending Moment Diagram

The max bending moment is 9600 lb*in.

Process for Optimization

Our methods for optimizing the beam design consisted of developing a MATLAB code

(Appendix 1) and using our knowledge from class in order to enter appropriate numerical

relationships into the code. We knew we wanted to design an I-beam because it maximized the

area away from the neutral axis, thus decreasing the amount of normal stress and shear stress

within the beam. We also tried to find the appropriate flange thickness such that it decreased the

shear stress in the beam, while only increasing the weight slightly. With this knowledge, we

entered different dimensions into the MATLAB code in order to determine which dimensions led

to the highest strength to weight ratio.

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The MATLAB code requires the user to enter values for the web thickness, web length,

flange thickness, and flange length and can be run with any combination of oak and pine. The

code then finds the normal stress, shear stresses, strength to weight ratio, and safety factors for

the given beam dimensions. We entered beam dimensions using the thought process described

above until we found the highest strength to weight ratio. The strength was determined by

multiplying the lowest safety factor calculated by the load of 2000 lb. We did all of this while

adhering to the constraints listed in the project guidelines.

We optimized the strength to weight ratio by making the safety factors just slightly above

one. The goal was for our theoretical failure load to be within 20% of the actual failure load.

Therefore, we wanted a safety factor slightly above one, knowing that the imperfections of the

wood and the glue at the joints could cause it to fail early. This ultimately led us to conclude that

an I-beam with a width of 1.5 inches, depth of 3.36 inches, web thickness of 0.38 inches, and

flange thickness of 0.28 inches had the highest strength to weight ratio.

Calculations of Failure Loads

Flexure:
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Wood Shear:

Glue Shear:

Maximum Deflection and Location

○ The max deflection is -0.07825in and will occur at 11.58in from the left side of
our beam or 10.58in from the 800 lb force.
○ We found the max deflection using Desmos and the y equation above. Since we
used Desmos we had to use two graphs. The first graph was the y equation
without the middle terms and it measured deflection of the beam from 0-12in
from the 800lb reaction force. The second graph used the full y equation and
measured deflection of the beam from 13-20in from the 800lb reaction force
○ Both graph are link in the appendix on page 17
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Strength-to-Weight Ratio, Failure Type, Location (Prior to Testing)

○ Our predicted strength-to-weight ratio is 4257.5

➢ Predicted failure type and location:

○ Predicted failure type will be glue shear with a value of 758.51 psi
○ The predicted location of where the beam will fail are at the joints between the
web and the flanges

Test Results

The maximum load that our beam supported was 1766 lbf and the weight of our beam

was 13.4 oz, or 0.8375 lbs. This means that our final strength to weight ratio was 2,109. Our

beam failed due to a flange crack. This crack was along the grain of the wood. This is a weak

point in wood that ultimately caused our beam to fail. Our deflection was 1.025in. We do not

believe that this was entirely due to the deflection of the beam itself. When we looked at the

beam after testing, the shims were very compressed, leading us to believe that part of this

deflection was due to the compression of the shims.

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Comparison to Predictions (from 9-11 and actual values from 12)

When doing the predicted calculations, we calculated that our beam would fail from

normal stress at 5989.3 psi, from wood shear at 1195.23 psi, and from glue shear at 758.51 psi.

Ultimately we predicted that glue shear would be the mode of failure for our beam, at the joints

in between the web and the flanges. In testing, our beam did not end up failing from any of those

predicted failure modes, but from a flange crack instead at the location of the applied load. Our

failure occurred at an applied load of 1766 lbf, which with our expected load of 2000 lbf, was

234 lbf less than we expected. For our maximum deflection, we calculated the beam would

deflect 0.07825in and it would occur at 11.58in, but it deflected 1.025 inches. The reason we

believe our beam deflected more than our predicted value is because of the compression from the
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shims. Finally, our initial strength-to-weight ratio was 4257.5, and using our safety factor of

1.25, our actual strength-to-weight ratio was 2,635.8.

Discussion of Results

Our beam underwent the compressive load resulting in a flange crack, finalizing the total

applied load to be 1766 lbf. With our expected applied load to be 2000 lbf, the beam underwent

234 lbf less than what we expected. Our expected mode of failure was shear at the glue. Yet, our

actual mode of failure was a flange crack. The flange cracks were along the grain of the wood,

which is the weakest point in wood. Identifying this resulted in us better understanding why and

where our beam failed: our flange thickness was too small. The beam itself did not collapse on

itself in a way of bending, normal or shear stress which were the three failure modes we

calculated for this project. Even if our beam did not fail in a way we expected, our beam was still

able to successfully withstand an applied load between the range of 1,000 - 2,500 lbs. Moving

forward, we now know that we have to take flange cracks into consideration when designing our

beam.

Conclusion

Overall, our project went about as well as we expected; it withstood a very large force of

1766 lbf, but it was slightly under what we expected it to be. There are some improvements we

can make to our design, but overall we are proud of the work we did. Our matlab code was very

efficient in giving us dimensions for our beam within the constraints of the project. Perhaps

something that we can do differently (now knowing that our actual mode of failure was flange

failure) is make our flanges a little thicker to compensate for flange failure. Another way to
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improve our beam is to find pine wood that has the least amount of imperfections; however, that

wasn’t possible for this project. So, I feel as though we did really well with what we were

provided.

In conclusion, this was a fun and thought-provoking project. We worked well as a team,

and we were able to efficiently combine and mix all of our inputs for this project. We had good

communication throughout this project, and we were able to meet all the deadlines in a timely

manner. We never felt as though we were being extremely rushed. This project was very good

practice for how to work well in a group, and that is a skill we will all need in our future

engineering careers.
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Appendix (Calculations for optimization of final beam dimensions)

Code:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1j_n0nloQEyuJfN0Y_TUzbUMp-FU6UT_x/view?usp=sharing

%Given Values

dOak = 0.024; %lb/in^3

dPine = 0.014; %lb/in^3
EOak = 1.8e6; %psi
EPine = 1.5e6; %psi
M = 9600; %inlb
V = 1200; %lb
L = 22; %in
%These are average values from the PDF
SyPine = 14327;
SyOak = 17873;
SysPine = 1492;
SysOak = 2873;
SysGluePine = 989;

%User defined
Bmid = 0.38; %in Best: 0.38
Hmid = 2.8; %in Best: 2.8
b = 1.5; %in Best: 1.5
h = 0.28; %in Best: 0.28

Iz = ((1/12)*b*((2*h)+Hmid)^3) - ((1/12)*b*Hmid^3) + ((1/12)*Bmid*Hmid^3);

Q = (Hmid/4)*(Hmid/2)*Bmid + ((Hmid/2)+(h/2))*h*b;

%Normal Stress
y = h+(0.5*Hmid);
normalStress = (M*y)/Iz

%Shear Stress
shearStress = (V*Q)/(Bmid*Iz)

%Weight calculations
Vol = L*((2*b*h)+(Bmid*Hmid));
Wp = Vol*dPine;
Wo = Vol*dOak;

% Shear stress glue

QGlue = h*b*((h/2)+(Hmid/2));
shearStressGlue = (V*QGlue)/(Bmid*Iz)

%Safety Factor Normal Stress

SFNp = SyPine/normalStress
SFNo = SyOak/normalStress;
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%Safety Factor Shear Stress

SFTp = SysPine/shearStress
SFTo = SysOak/shearStress;
%Safety Factor Glue Shear
SFg = SysGluePine/shearStressGlue
%Safety Factor for normal stress/weight
SFN_Wp = SFNp/Wp
SFN_Wo = SFNo/Wo;
%Safety Factor for shear stress/weight
SFT_Wp = SFTp/Wp
SFT_Wo = SFTo/Wo;
%Safety Factor for glue stress/weight
SFg_Wp = SFg/Wp

%Strength to weight ratios

normalStoW = normalStress/Wp;
shearStoW = shearStress/Wp;
glueStoW = shearStressGlue/Wp;

%Strength over weight

SafetyFactorArr = [SFNp, SFTp, SFg];
minSafety = min(SafetyFactorArr);
final = (2000*minSafety)/Wp

% Strength is the predicted amount it should be able to hold

strength = minSafety*2000

Output:

% Predicted stress values

normalStress = 5.9894e+03
shearStress = 1.1952e+03
shearStressGlue = 758.5199
% Safety Factor Normal Stress for pine
SFNp = 2.3921
% Safety Factor for Shear Stress for pine
SFTp = 1.2483
% Safety Factor for Glue
SFg = 1.3039
SFN_Wp = 4.0790
SFT_Wp = 2.1286
SFg_Wp = 2.2234
strength = 2.4966e+03
% Predicted strength to weight ratio
final = 4.2572e+03
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Deflection graph from 0≤x≤12: https://www.desmos.com/calculator/uz4tiybkzi

Deflection graph from 13≤x≤20: https://www.desmos.com/calculator/fcah9025d0