Preface

Trusses and frames have always been the main components of load carrying structures. Even though technological improvements have replaced many standard elements over the time, trusses and frames have held their position as indispensable elements. Today, application areas of these elements have changed from nano to mega structures and many researchers have studied them using several methods (numerical, analytical, and experimental).

This book attempts to explain some recent studies. It is written for academic researchers with an interest in analyzing truss and frame structures. It contains two sections and six chapters. In the first section, different numerical approaches are given. The first chapter presents an approach to assessing the dynamic stability of a structure. As a case study, the two link mechanism is selected. The second chapter shows an application of the finite element method in analysis of catenary-like structures. Results are compared with real data. The third and last chapter of this section presents the use of the differential evolution algorithm to optimize the truss systems considering natural frequencies of vibrations. The second section presents three different studies on obtaining lightweight structures. The fourth chapter reviews studies using topology optimization methods to find suitable geometry to obtain lightweight structures. The fifth chapter presents several design solutions to light combined structures. The sixth chapter focuses on finding suitable material properties for the sandwich core model used in analysis of parts built by direct metal sintering method. We hope that the book is helpful to researchers in the field of analysis of truss-frame structures and related areas.

> **Dr Aykut Kentli** Professor, Marmara University, Engineering Faculty, Mechanical Engineering Department, Istanbul, Turkey

Section 1

Numerical Analysis

of Structures

1

Section 1
