David Yeomans 
How Structures Work [EPUB ebook] 
Design and Behaviour from Bridges to Buildings

Preface x
1 Brackets and Bridges 1
Cooper’s tragedy 2
The Forth Bridge 4
Members in compression 6
The Quebec Bridge 8
Forces in a bracket 9
The design process 13
Stresses 14
2 Stiffening a Beam — Girder Bridges 16
The simple truss 22
Tension trusses 27
Girder bridges: The Forth Bridge 31
3 Arches and Suspension Bridges 33
Building an arch 35
Blackfriars Bridge 37
Pontypridd Bridge 39
The forces in an arch 39
Practical issues 41
Forces within the arch ring 43
Edwards’s failure 48
An unexpected failure 49
Arch with point load 50
Iron and concrete arches 51
The suspension bridge 54
Arches in buildings: Flying buttresses 57
Arches in walls 60
4 Bringing the Loads to the Ground — The Structural Scheme 63
Introduction 63
The alternatives 64
Nature of the loads 66
Choices 68
‘Flow of forces’ or action and reaction 71
Describing the structure 73
Structures are three-dimensional 75
Statically indeterminate structures 76
5 Safe as Houses? — Walls 79
Bricks and mortar 81
Point loads and openings 85
Cavity walls 88
Thick walls 90
Foundation loads 93
Horizontal loads 94
Rafter thrusts 98
Foundation stresses 101
6 Frames — A Problem of Stability 103
Timber framing 104
Construction of a barn 108
Bracing forces 111
Bending in the post 112
Light frame construction 113
The coming of iron 115
The frame today 122
The multistorey frame 126
Columns 130
7 Floors and Beams — Deflections and Bending Moments 134
The need for science 140
Floors and deflections 140
The forces in the beam 142
Strain 143
Galileo’s cantilever 145
Finding the stresses 147
From cantilever to beam 148
Iron and steel beams 150
Cast iron 150
Reinforced concrete beams 153
Continuous beams 155
Shear 159
Two-way floors 160
Other structures in bending 163
Prestressing 168
8 Providing Shelter — Roofs 173
Common rafter roofs 174
Purlin roofs 179
Longitudinal stability 185
The roof truss 188
The coming of iron 190
Three-dimensional roofs 192
9 Structures in a Three-Dimensional World 198
Vaults 198
The pointed vault 202
Elaborations on the basic vault form 203
Building vaults 206
Domes 207
Some historical examples 212
The modern three-dimensional structure 216
Anticlastic forms 220
Structures in tension 222
Structures for their time and place 224
10 Materials and Workmanship 226
Walling materials 227
Timber 228
Iron and steel 229
Compatibility of materials 233
Material development and design 234
Appendix: Some Elements of Grammar 235
Glossary 241
Index 250

About the Author
David Yeomans is an engineer, historian and teacher. He has taught in several schools of architecture in the United Kingdom and the United States, has been a consultant on World Heritage Sites and has written widely on the history of building structures.