VIRTUAL WORK

Techniques for analysing determinate and indeterminate structures to determine axial forces, shear forces, bending moments and deflections

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PREMIUM COURSES

Fundamentals of Virtual Work for Civil Engineers

Level up your structural analysis skillset with these powerful Civil Engineering analysis techniques.

After completing this course…

  • You will have a complete understanding of how concepts such as work, energy and elasticity combine to give us the Principle of Virtual Work.
  • You will be able to use Virtual Work to calculate unknown nodal displacements in pin-jointed truss structures.
  • You will be able to use Virtual Work to calculate internal forces in pin-jointed truss structures.

Mastering Virtual Work for Civil Engineering

Analyse complex beam and frame civil engineering structures using Virtual Work.

Mastering Virtual Work for Civil Engineering | DegreeTutors.com

After completing this course…

  • You will have a complete understanding of the Principle of Virtual Work and how it can be applied to bending behaviour.
  • You will have robust, repeatable strategies to apply Virtual Work to beam and frame structures in bending.
  • You will be able to use Virtual Work techniques to calculate unknown displacements in beams and frames.

Analysing Hybrid Indeterminate Civil Engineering Structures

Powerful techniques for analysing realistic civil engineering structures.

After completing this course…

  • You will learn how to analysis complex and indeterminate structures using hand-analysis techniques.
  • You will learn how to calculate deflections, member forces and bending moments in indeterminate structures.
  • You will learn how the Principle of Superposition can be used to decipher and unlock the behaviour of complex structures.

TUTORIALS

The Virtual Work Method | DegreeTutors.com

How to Apply the Virtual Work Method to Trusses

In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to use the virtual work method to analyse trusses and calculate truss deflections. The virtual work method is based upon the Principle of Virtual Work which underpins many elegant and versatile analysis procedures. We’ll focus here on how it can be applied to trusses. This tutorial will initially develop the underlying theory, starting with the concept of strain energy. This will make the jump to virtual work much easier to understand. We’ll bring it all together with a thorough worked example at the end.

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Fundamentals of Virtual Work for Civil Engineers

Enhance your structural analysis skillset with these powerful engineering analysis techniques

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In this course you’ll be introduced to an immensely powerful method of civil engineering analysis. A fundamental requirement of any civil engineer is an ability to estimate how a structure will deform and behave under load. The Principle of Virtual Work is an elegant and efficient tool that gives us that ability. Being able to look at a structure and estimate the magnitude of its deflection is a key milestone in the development of any engineering student – the aim for this course is to help you hit that milestone!

If you take this course, don’t expect to sit back and let the videos wash over you – you’ll need to actively work your way through the course, constantly comparing your developing understanding with what you learn in each lecture.

You’re strongly encouraged to develop your own notes as we move through the course…we’ll be avoiding ‘death by PowerPoint’ at all costs. The mode of presentation is predominantly through hand-drawn notes and sketches; a method universally favoured by every engineering student I’ve ever had!

Mastering Virtual Work for Engineers

Analyse complex beam and frame structures using Virtual Work

Play Video

In this course you will develop analysis strategies that allow you to apply the Principle of Virtual Work to beam and frame structures. In order to fully leverage this powerful engineering principle, you need to be able to apply it to structures that experience bending. That’s the focus of this course.

As an engineer, a fundamental skill is being able to estimate how a structure will deflect and by how much! The Principle of Virtual work allows us to develop extremely efficient analysis techniques to accomplish this task using only hand calculation. By the end of this course you will be confident in calculating unknown deflections for the majority of civil engineering structures you’re likely to face. More importantly you’ll understand exactly how and why this techniques works; no black-box equations!

Each video lecture is structured and delivered to ensure you get the most out of your time investment. If you take this course, don’t expect to sit back and let the videos wash over you – you’ll need to actively work your way through the course, constantly comparing your developing understanding with what you learn in each lecture.

You’re strongly encouraged to develop your own notes as we move through the course…we’ll be avoiding ‘death by PowerPoint’ at all costs. The mode of presentation is predominantly through hand-drawn notes and sketches; a method universally favoured by every engineering student I’ve ever had!

Analysing Hybrid Indeterminate Civil Engineering Structures

Powerful techniques for analysing realistic civil engineering structures.

Play Video

In this course we’ll apply the Principle of Virtual Work and the Principle of Superposition to analyse complex indeterminate civil engineering structures. Engineering students typically start learning structural analysis by focusing on simple trusses, then beams and frames.

In reality many civil engineering structures are complex hybrids of both axially loaded (truss) and bending (beam and frame) elements. Realistic civil engineering structures are also very often statically indeterminate, meaning direct application of simple statics alone won’t unlock their behaviour.

In this course it is these complex, indeterminate structures that we’ll focus on analysing. We’ll start by developing a solution strategy. You’ll develop a sound understanding of this strategy as we develop everything from simple first principles, namely, Virtual Work and Superposition.

The second half of the course focuses on implementation – you will work your way through a number of challenge questions, with my worked solutions as your back-up if you get stuck. By the end of this course you’ll be confidently analysing structures that leave most other students scratching their heads in confusion.