Engineering Structures, Vol. 19, No. 5, p.
393, 1997
ELSEVIER
B O O K REVIEWS
Preparing for project
management
David J. Williams, ASCE Press,
New York, 1996, 85pp., $24.00,
ISBN 0-7844-0175-6
This is a short review of a small book
aimed at people who are just about to ven-
ture into project management for the first
time and who have had little or no edu-
cation or training in it. It aims to cover all
important aspects of project management,
including an index and a list of suggested
reading, in just 85 pages. With such an
aim, it cannot possibly cover alternatives
and it is based firmly on a personal philo-
sophy of project management which has
obviously worked well for the author but
which may not be accepted in all aspects
by all organizations.
Most aspects which would normally be
found in project management texts are pre-
sent however briefly. There are mentions
of the project, the process, work plans and
the planning process, meetings of various
sorts, schedules, budgets, monitoring, con-
trolling, total quality management, market-
ing, the effects of size, the effects of
changes, pertormance curves and monitor-
ing, and management practices. Other top-
ics which are often ignored by project
management texts are also mentioned.
These include dealing with the press, pro-
per dress, ethics and etiquette. Many of the
points, however, are covered too thinly to
provide a true insight into their importance
and use.
The text is clearly presented and
because it is so short, the reader can take
in much if not all of it at a single sitting.
It is written from an American perspective
but can be easily translated into other geo-
graphical areas and contract situations.
There is a short section of further read-
ing, but this like the rest of the book is
rather too short to be of great use.
M. J. Mawdesley
Mechanics of engineering
materials
(2nd edition)
P. P. Benham, R. J. Crawford
and C. G. Armstrong, Longman,
1996, 627 pp. £21.99, ISBN: 0
582 25164 8
This is an excellent textbook on the mech-
Plh S0141-0296(96)00132-0
anics of solids, which covers the core
material for undergraduate courses in
mechanical engineering and related disci-
plines. The book is relatively inexpensive
and represents good value when compared
with the large number of textbooks cover-
ing the same material which are currently
available.
The book begins (chapters 1-4) with a
very clear definition of the basis of the
subject. Statically determinate and stati-
cally indeterminate systems are described
with the concepts of equilibrium, compati-
bility and stress-strai n (load-deformation)
relationships being introduced. The sum-
maries at the beginning and end of each
chapter are particularly useful and many
practical examples have been used to
reinforce the material. The use of free-
body diagrams is emphasized at the outset
and thereafter used continuously.
The concepts introduced in chapters 1-
4 are applied to torsion of solid or tubular
members and to thin-walled closed and
open noncircular sections in chapter 5.
Methods for determining shear stress dis-
tributions and angular twist are presented.
Chapters 6 - 8 cover methods for determin-
ing shear forces, bending moments,
stresses and deformations of beams sub-
jected to bending. All of the important
loading, support and analysis methods are
covered.
The concepts of virtual work, strain
energy and complementary strain energy
are introduced in chapter 9 and used to
solve a number of problems, including the
determination of the stiffness of helical
springs. The application of Castigliano's
theorem to structural problems is shown to
offer an efficient solution procedure for
some problem types.
Buckling instability is covered in chap-
ter 10. Idealized buckling loads are derived
for columns with large slenderness ratios.
The effects of eccentricity, initial curvature
and transverse loading as well as the yield-
ing of relatively 'short' struts on the insta-
bility are included in this chapter. Also, the
idea of local buckling is introduced.
The extremely important topics of stress
and strain transformations, Mohr's circle,
principal stresses, maximum shear stress
and interpretation of electrical resistance
strain gauge data are very clearly
explained in chapter 11. The methodical
approach, together with the very clear dia-
grams and carefully chosen worked
393
,~ 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd
Primed in Great Britain. All rights reserved
0141-0296/97 $17.00 + 0.(~)
examples, make this a particularly valuable
section for undergraduate teaching pur-
poses. A brief introduction to the analysis
of composites is also included in this chap-
ter.
The maximum shear stress and von
Mises yield criteria are described in chap-
ter 12. A number of examples are used to
show how these criteria can be used to
establish the load levels at which yielding
will occur. The concept of a stress concen-
tration is introduced and a number of prac-
tical examples are used to emphasize the
importance of the plasticity and stress con-
centration factor aspect to design analysis.
The postyield behaviour of simple struc-
tures (chapter 15) is used to illustrate the
principles of analysis. The ideas of residual
stress due to plastic deformation and limit
loads can be easily grasped from the
material presented.
The theoretical analysis of more compli-
cated components (e.g. pressurized cylin-
ders, rotating discs, plates and shells) is
covered in chapters 13-15. The emphasis
is placed on application and the compli-
cated derivations are reduced to a small
number of easily identified, key equations;
these chapters should be particularly help-
ful to undergraduate students encountering
the material for the first time.
The basic concepts of the very important
topic of finite element analysis are intro-
duced (chapter 17). The authors emphasize
that some excellent commercial packages
exist for performing finite element analy-
sis.
Various important material properties
(hardness, fracture, fatigue and creep) are
described in chapters 18-21. The impor-
tance of these material properties for
design is included and the links between
these material properties and the stress and
deformation analysis methods in the earlier
chapters of the book in relation to design
are included.
It is clear from reading this textbook that
the authors have had many years of experi-
ence in teaching the subject. This experi-
ence has resulted in the emphasis on basic
concepts, the incorporation of many
worked examples, which have been care-
fully graded, the use of clear diagrams, the
highlighting of key equations and the
incorporation of clear summary sections at
the beginning and end of each chapter.
7-. H. Hyde