ES 240

Nathan Thielen and I will be investigating straight beams, bent beams and how the analysis can be applied to hooks. We did not have much time to investigate beams in ES240 this term so we hope to gain a broader understanding of this area and share our findings with the rest of the class. The primary goal is to compare the analysis necessary for straight beams versus the analysis needed for bent beams. We choose the project because we also will have ample opportunity to investigate bent beams and hooks using FEM.

Christian and I thought comparing the theory of bent beams to that of straight beams would be interesting because we only explored straight beams this semester in class. Bent beams are important since they are encountered regularly in practice, for example a hook. The geometry of a bent beam changes the equations governing the behavior. So, understanding how the geometry changes the beams behavior is our primary interest.

Stress/Strain Analysis of Bullet-Holeson the Boeing 737 Fuselage Boeing 737 is the most popular aircraft in the sky today, with each one taking off or landing on average of every 6 seconds. One of the most important analyses conducted on these passenger aircrafts is determining the impact of any damage on the fuselage.

Overview.  This post is a description of the project Sunny Wicks and I will be pursuing for this class, to satisfy the requirements for Problem 29.

Professor Vlassak mentioned that last year every single person did a finite element project.  He said he wanted to see more theory projects, so I decided to take him up on that.

I was browsing around one day and happened upon an article that explained that while the Green's function of the laplacian was positive definite, the biharmonic operator's Green's function is not.  Physically, this has significance. 

I work in the Microrobotics lab here at Harvard, where we focus on the construction of biomimetic insect-sized microrobots. Traditional machining techniques are insufficient to create parts on this small scale, so we utlize laser-machined composite materials (such as carbon fiber), which are relatively rigid, and thin polymer films, which are relatively flexible. These materials can be sandwiched together in sheets to create compliant flexure joints, analagous to macro-scale revolute joints.

See attachment for ES 240 lecture notes on viscoelasticity.

This problem set is due Friday, Dec.7, 2007.

ES 240 notes for Bending of plates is attached.

This problem set is due Monday, Nov.26, 2007.