Faculty of Science, Engineering and Technology

MEE20004 - STRUCTURAL MECHANICS

LAB. 3 - BEAM BENDING - 2015 Sem. 2

By writing my name below, I declare this is an individual assignment and no part of this submission
has been copied from any other student's work or from any other source except where due
acknowledgment is explicitly made in the text, nor has any part been written for me by another
person. Refer to Unit of Study Outline for Plagiarism guidelines.

STUDENT NAME & No. : Shehan Fernando (7664613)

Lab. Date & Time 12/10/2015

Demonstrator : Dr. Jinghai Lu

INTRODUCTION :
The aim of this laboratory is to compare experimental and theoretical deflections of a solid steel
beam subjected to three point bending. Load is applied using a GUNT bending device.

PROCEDURE :
1. Measure the dimensions of test beam cross-section and distance between two roller supports.
Calculate the central applied Load required to produce a max. bending normal stress of 190
MPa in the beam. (Note: use Eqs. 1a, 1b and 1c shown on the next page.)
Measured Width (mm)
*Average Width (b) (mm)
38.10
38.07
38.12
38.09

12.88

Measured Height (mm)

12.64
12.61

*Average Height (h) (mm)

12.71

NOTE : Measure & record b and h at three locations and use Average values in calculations.
Distance between the roller supports (L) =
300
mm
Calculated Load (P) =
2.598
kN
2. Ensure force and deflection are initially zeroed. Apply the Load calculated in step 1 and record
the resulting beam deflection under the indenter. (Note : Is y reading +ve Or ve ?)
Actual measured load (P) =
2.608
kN
Final measured /experimental deflection (y) =
1.294
(show sign and units)
3. Determine Theoretical value for EI by multiplying the I determined in step 1 with E= 200 GPa.
EI THEORY =
1304
(show sign and
units)
4. Calculate the theoretical deflection by using Eq. 1(a) - (d) shown overleaf.
Theoretical deflection (y) =
(show sign and units)
Force P

Indenter

Roller support

L/2

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Test beam

For Central Load:

b
h3
I
12

M MAX.

max

Eq. (1a)

P
L
4

M
c
I

Eq. (1b)

P
y
4 x 3 3 L2 x
48 EI

Eq. (1c)

Eq. (1d)

5. Unload beam and change the position of one roller support so that the beam is now nonsymmetrically loaded as shown below. Apply the same calculated load as in Step (1) (which
should not exceed 2.7 kN) and record final deflection.
x (mm)
u (mm)
v (mm)
L (mm)
Actual
Final
measured
experimental
load (kN)
deflection
(mm)
200/2=100
200/2=100 300/2=150
100+150=250
2.617
0.732
Calculate the theoretical value of deflection by using Eq. (2).
Theoretical deflection =

(show sign and units)

Force P

Indenter

Test beam

x
Roller
support

v=150mm

u=100mm
L

For Non-symmetric Load:

Pv
y
x 3 L2 - v 2 x , L u v
6 EIL

Eq. (2)

LABORATORY REPORT:
Type and edit your report using Microsoft Word (hand-written is not acceptable except for the
sample calculation). Email your individual Lab. Report to your demonstrator by due Date 1
week after conducting Lab. Please scan your report and save whole report as one PDF file with a
name of Surname_Initial_Student ID_Lab3.pdf. Please see the Study Guide or Blackboard for
your demonstrators email address. Please refer to Unit of Study Outline for penalties etc.
The Report must include (in order) :
(i) This handout as cover sheet /results for your report (1 mark).
(ii) Discussion and Conclusion, compare the experimental and theoretical deflections for both
central and non-symmetrical loadings. Discuss errors and possible reasons. The expected
length of the Discussion is between half and one full page using 12 font size with 1.5 line
space (200-400 words). (2 marks).

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Discussion
After completing the experiment, when comparing the theoretical values to experimental values it
appeared be different but not significantly. There are multiple factors that could have resulted in an
error of the results; one of them being machine is not working at 100%, the machine has been used
for a while and it will have some faults in it. Secondly human error could have played a factor too
when measuring, the metal bar, when setting up the machine and taking the final experimental
measurements

Conclusion

,
Overall I believe this was an successful experiment, it was able to show the purpose of this
experiment. There is not much we can do to make the experiment more controlled, we did the best by
calculating the averages of length and heights to avoid any possible errors, perhaps one thing we
could have done is to re collaborated the machines before each experiments to gain a result that is
closer to the theoretical values

(iii)

Sample Calculations

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