Behaviour of two way slabs in bending

When a slab is supported on all it four of its sides, it effectively span in both direction to transfer their loads to all the four support walls. The amount of bending will depend on the ratio of the two spans and the condition restraints at each support. (Restrained condition means each support gives control support within their limits). When subjected under loads, the load will span equally in both direction with condition that the slab is square and restrains are similar along the four sides. In contrast, more than one half of the load will be carried in the stiffer, shorter direction and less in longer direction with condition that the slab is rectangular. Meanwhile, large proportion of the load will be carried in the short direction in the short direction and the slabs may as well be designed as spanning in only one direction with condition that one span is much longer than the other.

In the tensile zone of the slab and especially in the middle of its span, hairline cracking occurs on the concretes surface. These cracks may not be visible to the human eye but they exist, without though affecting the slabs behavior. Diagonal stresses appear on the slabs support faces but as a rule they are dealt with by the concrete thus no transverse reinforcement is needed. In the upper extreme fibers of the slab supports, it is possible for tensile stresses to appear; therefore a minimum amount of longitudinal reinforcement is placed in these areas.

Simply supported slabs When subjected under loadings, a slab simply supported on its four sides will deflect about both axes the corner tends to lift and curl up from the support, causing torsional moments. Moment coefficient should be used to prevent lifting or resisting the torsion.

From here , the total load on the slab is carried not only by bending moments in two directions but also by the twisting moments

The twisting moments are usually of consequence only at exterior comers of a two-way slab system, where they tend to crack the slab at the bottom along the panel diagonal, and at the top perpendicular to the panel diagonal. Special reinforcement should be provided at exterior corners in both the bottom and top of the slab, for a distance in each direction from the corner equal to one-fifth the longer span of the corner panel.

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