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A Practical Method to Determine Influence Surfaces using Commercial

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Article · January 2007

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-75999-7_82

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 A Practical Method to Determine Critical Moments Using
Influence Surfaces and Spreadsheets

Jackson Kong

Division of Building Science and Technology, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

Abstract: In this paper, a simple yet practical method is presented for the determination of critical bending
moments of bridge decks subject to traffic loads by using influence surfaces and simple computing tools.
By means of commercial finite element software, the influence surface is first obtained automatically by put-
ting unit loads across the region concerned, and corresponding results are exported to spreadsheets. A
least square fit to the classical thin-plate solutions, based on the computed results, is subsequently deter-
mined. Based on the least-square fit solution, the exact location of the designed vehicle load and the corre-
sponding critical moments can be obtained using simple and readily available optimization tools in Excel.
The principle behind the approach is only based on the least-square approach and the thin-plate theory. The
method does not involve any complicated mathematics or special software and all computations can be eas-
ily done on a spreadsheet tool like Excel, thus facilitating engineers to implement the method in practice.

Key words: influence surfaces, critical moments, bridge decks, Excel, spreadsheets.

cal stress can be found by simply placing the designed

Introduction load repeatedly on various positions of the chart, and
by comparing the results, an approximate optimum
Structures are subject to dead load and live load;
value can be easily found. The method is simple and
the latter refers to loads which would act on various
has the advantage that the chart can be applied for dif-
possible positions. It is very often necessary for prac-
ferent types of designed loads. However, it suffers
ticing structural engineers to determine how
from the drawback that such influence surface charts
stresses/deformation at some critical locations of the
are readily available only at a limited number of loca-
structures would vary according to the positions of live
tions for uniform plates with simple boundary condi-
loads. For simple structures and simple loadings, engi-
tions and geometries[1-2]. As such, the method has very
neers could easily assign live loads to positions that
limited applications, or otherwise simplifications and
would generate the most critical stress components
assumptions are necessary to be made in order to apply
concerned at the critical locations of the structure,
these influence surface charts to practical structures.
based on experience. For complicated structures like a
2) the designed load is repeatedly placed on vari-
bridge deck under traffic loads or similar plate-type
ous locations of the structure and the corresponding re-
structures however such a determination is not always
sults are computed by commercial finite element soft-
obvious, and two common approaches are usually
ware. Critical stresses can be found from the envelope
adopted by practicing engineers in order to obtain the
of the computer results. Despite the simplicity and ver-
critical stress components concerned, namely:
satility of this approach, the accuracy of the critical
1) a manual method by using influence lines
values so obtained depends on the range of the posi-
and/or influence surface charts available in the litera-
tions of designed load being used in the computation
ture and simple numerical integration tools. The criti-
and the fineness of the mesh used. In case only a lim-
ited number of positions are considered with a rela- the method proposed in this study, only a rectangular
tively coarse mesh, the critical values so obtained may plate with two opposite edges free and the remaining
not be close to the true optimum. On the other hand, a edges free is considered (see Figure 1). Influence sur-
lot of computations and data processing are necessary faces are directly generated using commercial FE
should a wide range of designed load positions are software; assuming that a unit load is applied succes-
used with a fine mesh. The method becomes very tedi- sively to each of the n nodal points of the mesh, the
ous in practice, particularly when several designed corresponding influence surface of nodal stress, M0,
loads need to be taken into consideration. at a specified nodal point of the plate can be computed
In this paper, a simple yet practical and direct me- and represented by a column vector {M0fem } with n
thod is presented for the determination of critical bend- entries. This computed influence surface can be veri-
ing moments of bridge decks subject to traffic loads by fied against influence surface charts available in the li-
using influence surfaces generated from commercial terature[1].
FE software. The influence surfaces are obtained by
putting unit loads across the region concerned and the 1.2 Designed loads
corresponding computed results are exported to a
Suppose that the plate is subject to a designed vehicle
spreadsheet. A least square fit to the classical thin-plate
with four square wheel loads separated apart as shown
solution, based on the computed results can be easily
in Figure 2. Assuming that the critical bending moment
obtained. Based on such a least-square solution, the lo-
at the center of the plate and the corresponding loca-
cations and the corresponding critical moments for dif-
tion of the vehicle is to be determined, this practical
ferent types of designed loads can be calculated ex-
problem can be formulated as:
actly by using a simple and readily available optimiza-
tion tools in Excel. Comparing with the two aforesaid
Maximize Mx0 (xc,yc) (1)
common approaches, the method is simple, versatile
and reliable, and it does not require any complicated
where (xc,yc) is the center of designed vehicle, and Mx0
mathematics or special software for practicing engi-
is the bending moment along x at the center of the
neers to implement.
plate, subject to the constraints that the vehicle shall
travel within the physical boundary of the plate:
1 Problem Description
(xL,yL) < (xc, yc) < (xU,yU). (2)
1.1 Influence surfaces

Several general approaches have been proposed in the 2 The proposed method
literature to determine influence surfaces. In particular,
a simple method of equivalent loads [3-6], based on the
2.1 Classical thin-plate bending solutions[7]
reciprocal theorem of linear elastic systems, could be
used to directly determine influence surfaces. The me- For a thin plate subject to a unit point load at (xi,yi), the
thod is versatile and computationally more effective solution of the governing equation of plate bending can
than the conventional “unit-load” method, but its ap- be written as the summation of a singular part and a
plications, unfortunately, involves the explicit form of non-singular part, i.e.,
the strain-displacement functions of the finite elements
used, which, for many commercial software, are usu- w(x,y)=βr2 ln r /πD+ non-singular part (3)
ally not known to practicing engineers, thus hindering where the singularity of the solution is attributed to the
its wide applications in practice. A recent literature logarithmic function. (The singular distribution of
survey of methods for obtaining influence lines and/or bending moment Mx in the plate due to a unit load at
influence surfaces are summarized in [6]. In this study, the center is shown in Figure 3). β is a parameter to be
the conventional unit-load method is used. determined. The non-singular part of the solution is de-
As a vehicle to illustrate the concept and procedure of termined by boundary conditions imposed. D denotes
the bending stiffness of the plate and r represents the
distance of a generic point (x,y) from the loaded posi-
tion:

r = √((x-xi)2 + (y-yi)2) (4)

Bending moments Mx, My and Mxy can be written in

terms of the deflection and its derivatives:

∂2w ∂2w ∂2w ∂2w

Mx = D ( + υ ) ; M y = D ( + υ )
∂x 2 ∂y 2 ∂y 2 ∂x 2
∂2w
Mxy = D(1-υ ( ))
2
(5)
∂x∂y

2.2 Least-square fit to FE computed influence sur-

face
Fig. 1 SAP model for a square plate with two opposite
Using equations (3) to (5), the bending moment influ- edges clamped and the other two free.
ence surface for Mx at a generic point (x,y) due to a
unit load at (xi ,yi) can be written as:

M x ( x, y; xi , yi )
∂ 2 (r 2 ln r ) ∂ 2 (r 2 ln r )
= β( + ν ) + P( xi , yi )
∂x 2 ∂y 2
= βWP + P( xi , yi )
(6)
in which the derivatives of the singular function WP( x,
y ; xi , yi ) can be easily worked out manually or using
Matlab.
In this study, the non-singular part in (6) is approxi-
mated as a polynomial function of order n. A complete
polynomial of order 7 is adopted, that is,

P(xi,yi)≈[1, xi, yi, xi2, xiyi, yi2,.......yi7]{α}

=[P1(xi,yi),P2(xi,yi),P3(xi,yi),…,P36(xi,yi)] {α}
(7) Fig. 2 A designed vehicle with four square wheel
loads separated by distances a and b apart. The center
where {α} is a column vector consisting of the corre-
of each wheel is at a/2 and b/2 from the center of the
sponding 36 parameters to be determined. Together
vehicle xc,, yc . Each wheel load is treated as a patch
with β, a total of 37 parameters need to be found. Pa- UDL.
rameters
β and {α} are then determined by enforcing that the
sum of the square of the difference between the mo-
ments calculated from (6) and (7) and those obtained
from the finite element software is minimum, that is,

Minimize ({Mx0fem } – {Mx0s})T({Mx0fem } – {Mx0s}) (8)

where {Mx0fem } is the column vector with n entries of 2.3 Moment due to patch loads
the computed FE bending moment at the center of the
For a uniformly distributed wheel load w of area hxh,
plate due to a unit load placed successively at each of
the bending moment at the center of the plate can be
the n nodes. {Mx0s} comprises the center bending
found by integrating (13), that is:
moment calculated from (6) and (7) due to a unit load
applied at each of the n-1 nodal points, except the cen- x+h y+h
ter of the plate, which moment cannot be calculated ∂ 2 (r 2 ln r ) ∂ 2 (r 2 ln r )
from (6) due to the singularity of WP thereat. As such,
Mx0 = ∫ ∫
x y
(β (
∂x 2
+ ν
∂y 2
)+
the column vector {Mx0s} can be written as: [P(xi ,yi )]{α}) dxi dyi (14)

⎧MXS 0 (x1, y1) ⎫ ⎡WP (x0 , y0 ; x1, y1) P1(x1, y1) P2 (x1, y1) .... P36(x1, y1) 0⎤⎧ β ⎫
⎪ ⎪ ⎢ ⎪ in which the closed form expression for the integral
⎪⎪ ... ⎪ ⎢ .... 0⎥⎥⎪⎪ α1 ⎪
⎪ ⎪ ⎪ is found using Matlab. The location of each wheel load
⎨MX0 (x0 , y0 )⎬ = ⎢ 0 1⎥⎨ ⎬
S
0 0 0 ...
⎪ ... ⎪ ⎢ ...
⎥
0⎥⎪ α36 ⎪
is defined by the center of the vehicle and the given
⎪ ⎪ ⎢ ⎪ ⎪
⎢ ... P36(xn , yn ) 0⎥⎦⎪⎩MXS 0 ⎭⎪ seperation of the wheel loads. The total bending mo-
⎩⎪MX0 (xn , yn )⎭⎪ ⎣WP (x0 , y0; xn , yn ) P1(xn , yn ) P2 (xn , yn )
S

ment due to the designed vehicle is then given by:

Î {Mx0s} = [N]{γ} (9) Mx0 (xc,yc) = ∑M x0

numberofwheels
(15)

where (x0,y0) is the center of the plate.

Substituting (9) into (8) gives:

({Mx0fem } –[N]{γ})T({Mx0fem } –[N]{γ})

={Mx0fem }T {Mx0fem } +{γ}T [N]T [N]{γ}- {γ}T[N]T

{Mx0fem }-{Mx0fem }T[N]{γ} (10)

Differentiating (10) with respect to {γ} gives:

([N]T [N]) {γ}=[N]T {Mx0fem } (11)

Solving for {γ} gives:

{γ}=[K]-1 {f} (12)

where [K]=[N]T [N] is a square matrix of size 38 and

its inverse can be easily computed using Excel. {f}=
[N]T {Mx0fem } is a column vector of the same length. Fig. 3 Singularity of bending moment Mx in the plate
due to a unit load at the center.
The bending moment at the center of the plate due to a
an unit load at (xi,yi) is then given by:

∂ 2 (r 2 ln r ) ∂ 2 (r 2 ln r )
β( + ν ) + [P(xi ,yi )]{α}
∂x 2 ∂y 2
(13)
2.4 Optimization using Excel tion, London, 1961.
[3] Ren H.L., Yeo J S, Shu L. Influence function of thin plates
Once the closed form expression of (14) is obtained, the
using finite strips: computational method and applications.
optimization problem as defined by equations (1) and (2)
Journal of Jianghan Petroleum Institute, 2000, 22(1), 56-58.
method is implemented on Excel using its built-in func-
tion “Solver”. (It is part of a suite of commands some- (in Chinese)
times called what-if analysis : A process of changing the [4] Liu S H, Wu H Q. A method to calculate influence function
values in cells to see how those changes affect the out- of member structure inner forces. Journal of Lanzhou Jiao-
come of formulas on the worksheet). With Solver, engi- tong University (Natural Sciences), 2004, 23(1), 1-5. (in
neers can find an optimal value of Mx0 (xc,yc), i.e. equa- Chinese)
tion (1), with constraints applied to the “design” variables [5] Shen W. The generalized Muller-Breslau principle for high-
(xc,yc) i.e. equation (2) to restrict the values. The General- er-order elements. Computers and Structures, 1992, 44,
ized Reduced Gradient (GRG2) nonlinear optimization 207-212.
method is used in “Solver”. A screen dump from the Ex- [6] Orakdogan E., Girgin K.M. A Direct determination of in-
cel file is given in Figure 4. fluence lines and surfaces by FEM. Structural Engineering
and Mechanics, 2005, 20(3), 279-292.
[7] Timsoshenko S. Theory of Plates and Shells. McGraw-Hill,
3 Numerical Examples
New York. 1959.
Numerical examples of square plates with various bound- [8] Kong J. A Practical method to determine critical moments
ary conditions and bridge decks of box girders, slab-on- in bridge decks using influence surfaces and spreadsheets
girders have been studied using the proposed method. It is (submitted to Computers & Structures)
found that, depending on the separation of the wheel
loads and the size of the wheels, the critical locations of
the vehicle that generate the optimal bending moment at
various locations can be easily estimated. Due to the lim- 5 Acknowledgement
ited scope of the paper, details of numerical results will
be presented in the Conference and reported elsewhere The work described in this paper was partially supported by
[8]. a grant from City University of Hong Kong (Project No.
7001774).

4 Conclusions and Future Work

Details of a method for obtaining critical bending mo-
ments in bridge decks or similar plate-type structures is
presented. The method is conceptually simple, and easy
to implement in practice. It does not involve any compli-
cated mathematics or special software. All calculations
can be done on Excel. Although the method is presented
only for plate-type structures, it can be applied to other
types of structures, provided that appropriate approximate
functions can be found. A sample code of implementation
on Excel could be obtained from the author upon request
for further applications and modifications.

References

[1] Pucher Adolf. Influence surfaces of Elastic Plates. Sprin-

ger-Verlag, New York, 1977.
[2] Rusch Hubert and Hergenroder Arnfrid. Influence surfaces
for moments in skew slabs. Cement and Concrete Associa-
 Fig. 4 A partial screen dump from the Excelspreadsheet.

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