Applied Forces

These are the forces applied externally to a body. Each of the forces is having contact with the body.
Depending upon type of their contact with the body, the applied forces may be classified as:
(i) Point Force
(ii) Distributed Forces
(i) Point Force: It is the one which has got contact with the body at a point. Practically there
is no force which will have contact with the body at a single point. However, when the contact area
is small compared to the other dimensions in the problem, for simplicity of calculation the force may
be considered as a point load. If a person stands on a ladder, his weight be taken as an applied point
load [Fig. 1.2]. Characteristics of such forces are already explained in Art. 1.1.
(ii) Distributed Forces: Distributed forces may act over a line, a surface or a volume.
Correspondingly they are known as linear, surface and body forces.
Linear Force: A linear force is one that acts along a line on the body. It is usually represented
with abscissa representing the position on the body and ordinate representing the magnitude of the
load. An example of this force is a beam subjected to uniformly distributed/uniformly varying or
general load. The force ‘dF’ at any small length ‘ds’ is given by