CHAPTER-6
Simple strip method
for slab analysis
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Introduction
Was developed by Hillerborg and published for the
first time in swedish in 1956.
Circumstances motivating Hillerborg are;
It is a lower bound theory based on the satisfaction
of equilibrium requirements everywhere in the slab.
Sometimes called an equilibrium theory and the
first coming task in this method is determination of
moment field and then after, the reinforcement at
every point in the slab will determined for this
moment field.
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If a distribution of moments can be found that satisfies
both equilibrium and boundary conditions for a given
external loading, and if the yield moment capacity of the
slab is nowhere exceeded the given external loading will
represent a lower bound of a true carrying capacity.
It gives a result always in a safe side and which is
certainly preferable in practice.
It is a design method by which the need reinforcement
can be calculated.
It encourages the designer to vary the reinforcement in
a logical way.
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This leading an economical arrangement of steel and as well
as safe design.
It is generally simple even to use for slabs with holes and
irregular boundary conditions.
The work was tested or validated by an experiment of
Armer and conclude that the method produces safe and
satisfactory design.
In contrast to the yield line method(provides no inducement
to vary bar spacing),it encourages the use of strong bands
of steel where needed, such as around openings or over
columns, and hence it improves economy and reducing
excessive cracking or large deflection under service load.
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BASIC PRINCIPLES
The governing equilibrium equation for a small
slab having side of dx and dy is
Where:
q is external load per unit area
mx, my is bending moment per unit width in
the x and y direction respectively
mxy is a twisting moment
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According to the lower bound theorem, any
combination of mx, my,and mxy that satisfies
the equilibrium equation at all points in the
slab and that meets boundary conditions is a
valid solution, provided that the reinforcement
is placed to carry these moments.
Considering the torsional effect assumed to be
zero, and therefore the reinforcement is
arranged in parallel to the axes in recti leaner
coordinate system.
mxy =0
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Therefore it can be reduces to :
This can be split to twistless beam strip action
In many regions in a slabs, the value of K will be
either zero or one.
In other regions, it may be reasonable to be the
load is divided equally in two directions. K =0.5
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CHOICE OF LOAD DISTRIBUTION
The desired goal is to arrive at an arrangement of
steel that is safe and economical and that will avoid
problems at the service load level associated with
excessive cracking and deflection.
For an economical decision its best to based the
elastic moment distribution.
To see and illustrate the choices open to the designer for about which one
way of stripping makes feasible as per the economy and even simplicity in
practice specially during reinforcement placement, consider the following
three scenarios having simply supported slab with a square dimension of “a”
length.
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Scenario1:
The load distribution setting with K = 0.5 over the
entire slab.
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The load on all strip in each direction is then equal to
q/2. and this gives a maximum moment value of:
over the whole slab with a uniform
lateral distribution across the width of the critical
section.
this not represent an economical and serviceable
solution because it is recognized that curvatures
below, hence moments, must be greater in the strips
near the middle of the slab than near the edges
parallel to the direction of the edges.
Extention of moment distribution accompanied by further
cracking in highly stressed regions(middle strip).
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Scenario2:
With the region of different load dispersion,
separated by the dash-dotted “discontinuity lines”
which follows the diagonals.
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For a strip at A-A at a distance y< =a/2 from the x
axis the moment is :
Regarding to the reinforcement it develops a
continuously varying bar spacing and this obviously
impractical.
its economical to the previous scenario that is
because of the stress become higher in middle strip
and this a logical distribution and makes an
economical and it provides an appropriate
reinforcement arrangement.
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Scenario3:
Division is made so that the load is carried to the
nearest support , its as before but the load near the
diagonals has been divided, with one half taken in
each direction .
Thus gives K values zero and one along the middle
edges and a value half in the corner and center of
the slab.
As compared to the previous scenarios, it leads a
practical arrangement, one with constant spacing
through the strip of width a/2 & wider spacing in
outer strip where the elastic moment and curvature
is known to be small.
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For an x direction strip along section A-A max.
moment is:
For x direction strip along section B-B max.
Moment is:
Way of stripping the slab in this method is
assumed to be in the form of scenario three
since it leads an economical and practical
arrangement of reinforcements.
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RECTANGULAR SLABS
It is reasonable to assume that In rectangular slab
through out most of the area the load carried by the
shorter direction.
Hillerborg first scenario:
For a rectangular section with simple supported
[Link] possible division is to be with discontinuity
lines originating from the slab corners at an angle
depending on the ratio of shorter to longer sides of the
slab.
But this scenario requires continuously varying
reinforcement.
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Scenario 2:
o To avoid continuously varying reinforcements from
the pervious scenario,Hillerborg suggests the
following distribution with discontinuity line parallel
to the side of the slab.
o The edge band width is equal to ¼ of the shorter
side of the slab.
o The load in the corner is divided equally in the x &
y directions while elsewhere all of the load is
carried in the direction indicated by arrows.
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For the economical reinforcement arraingement,determine
the moment distribution diagrams.(Exercise)
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FIXED EDGES AND CONTINUITY CASE
The discontinuity lines are shifted with a factor of
alpha to account the greater stiffness of strips of
fixed ends or the continuity, around the supports.
The factor alpha for the slab shown below is taken
less than 0.5.
“alpha” related directly to the ratio of negative to
positive moment in the strips.
The sum of the absolute value of positive span moment and
negative at the left or right end , ml , mr depends only on the
respective end condition and numerically equals to the
negative moment if the strip carries the load as a
cantilever.
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Hillerborg suggests as a general rule for fixed
ends, the support moment equal to 1.5 to 2.5
times the span moment in the same strip.
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Specialty of the method…
The real power of the strip method is becomes
evident when dealing with non standard
problems, such as slab with unsupported
edges, holes or slabs with reentrant corners
like L-shaped slabs.
Slab with unsupported edge
The special case in this analysis is that the strip
along unsupported edge takes a greater load
per unit area than the actual.
According to Wood and Armer such a strips
referred as a strong band.
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This strips usually have the same depth to the
remaining slab region but with high concentration
of reinforcement. and sometimes may be made
deeper than other regions but this will not be
always necessary.
Lets take a rectangular slab caring a uniformly
distributed load per unit area with fixed edge in
three sides and no support in one shorter side.
And the discontinuity flow as shown from figure
below.
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How to decide K?
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If the unsupported edge is in the long span direction,
then a significant fraction of the load in the slab central
region will be carried in the direction perpendicular to
the long edges, and the simple distribution shown below
is more suitable.
Strong band along the free edge serves as an integral
edge beam , with width normally chosen as low as
possible considering limitations on tensile reinforcement
ratio in the strong band.
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How to decide K1 & K2 ?
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Slab with Holes
(Reading?)
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EXAMPLES
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Revision on TOS II
Helpful for the analysis of maximum moments in the
span or supports of each strips once the load distribution
is prepared in correct ways presented before.
Moment distribution method/Kani method
Its an iterative method through the following main
points.
[Link] external applied load with form of
fixed end moments.
2. Distributing the unbalanced moments from the
free joints to adjacent members based on their
flexural stiffness.
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[Link] second iteration, if the first iteration is not converged
rebalance the moments from the free joints and distributing
it to the adjacent members and proceeding this step until
the unbalanced moment from the free joint becomes
decline.
Distribution factor :
Once the moment is distributed to the members, depending
on the support type found at end of the member , some part
of the member moment is transferred to the support with
factor called carry over factor.
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FEM computation tables
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Example-1
Determine strip moments for the following slab shown below.
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Example -2
For the previous simply supported rectangular slab loaded
with live load of 110KN/m2 and dead load of
150KN/m2,detemine the design moment distribution in the
shorter span direction.
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THANK YOU!
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