Making a truss adaptive to specific loading condition to save materials - Essay Example

As the active and passive control methods improved the structures under dynamic loads, its requirement for the performance based design was of concern. The use of these systems helps in achieving these objectives optimally in civil engineering. In a passive structural control, the structures have been built from a thermal stable composite material. This system can be isolation systems, shear walls, viscosities dampers and tuned mass dampers. The tuned mass dampers could be used in chimneys, towers and bridges (Sinan Korkmaz, 2011); for example in the Citicorp central New York to control the first mode of vibration (Peterson, N.R., 1979).

In the active control, a set of sensors and actuators connected by feedback is used (Berlin Heidelberg, 2011). The stiffness and the physical properties of the active systems can be changed due to the external stimuli so that structural response like the internal flow of forces can be manipulated as the deflections or the vibration are controlled and optimized. The active systems are striking choices to be able to retrofit or increase the strength of the current structure against strong winds, earthquake, water waves or any external force that affect the safety of the structure.

The adaptive systems are related to development and manufacturing. There are different material systems designed as smart materials and currently available in a wide range such including ceramics, polymers and alloys (W Sobek and P Tueffel, 2013). As shown in the figure … the sensors get the information and the control intelligence process the information getting from sensors and will feed into actuators. Every material, in principle, has been found to be responsive in a one-to-one relation.

For instance, voltage is produced from an input pressure, or it can be produced from a triangulated piece of veneer that displaces the free tip depends on the level of