2011

Strength of
Materials
Flexure Formula
Practical 2

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION .........................................................................................................................................................1
LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................................................................................................................1
AIM............................................................................................................................................................................1
LIST OF SYMBOLS ......................................................................................................................................................2
ABSTRACT..................................................................................................................................................................3
EXPERIMENTAL SET-UP .............................................................................................................................................3
RESULTS ....................................................................................................................................................................4
DIAGRAMS ................................................................................................................................................................5
CALCULATIONS..........................................................................................................................................................8
Error calculations ......................................................................................................................................................9
Error Percentage .......................................................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION.............................................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
When a material is subjected to a force, the material will undergo stress. Stress is an internal
resistance of a material due to force. The total stress developed is equal to the force. The
force and the area to which the force is applied can be measured. Therefore stress is the
force applied per cross-sectional area.
There are many types of stresses, but we mainly use normal stress and shear stress. If the
normal force is a pull force then it is regarded as tensile force and if the normal force is a push
then it is compressive.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Flexure formula relates the longitudinal stress distributed in the beam to the internal bending
moments on the beams cross section. To use this method we assume that the material
behaves in a linear-elastic manner so we may use Hookes law which is stress = young
modulus over strain. The normal stress will vary from zero at the neutral axis till the maximum
stress which is the distance farthest away from the neutral axis.
Using Flexure formula we can determine the normal stress. The actual maximum normal
stress will be 5.4% less than the calculated value, due to the theory of elasticity, because the
material will have a slight taper.

AIM
The aim of the practical is to validate the use of the flexure formula and to
measure normal stresses at a specific point in a beam.
Due to the fact that stress cannot be measured directly, strain gauges must be used to
measure the strain on the surface, this can then be changed to the stress via Hookes law,
which is
. With the experiment set up as depicted above one must use the fact that the
bending moment throughout the beam is known to determine the normal stress and calculate
the theoretical normal stress and compare the values to validate the flexure formula

LIST OF SYMBOLS
- the stress
the strain
youngs modulus
M - the moment about the neutral axis
y - the perpendicular distance to the neutral axis
Ix - the second moment of area about the neutral axis x
F - is the normal force
A - is the section area
A0 - is the original cross-sectional area through which the force is applied
L - is the amount by which the length of the object changes
L0 - is the original length of the object
- is the local bending radius (the radius of bending at the current section)
Y - is the position along y axis on the section area in which the stress is calculated

ABSTRACT
Bending, also known as flexure describes the behaviour of structural objects subjected to an
external load applied perpendicularly to a longitudinal axis of the object. The object is
assumed to be such that at least one of its dimensions is a small fraction, typically 1/10 or
less, of the other two. When the length is reasonably longer than the width and the thickness,
the element is called a beam. A horizontal pole under the weight of children on swings is an
example of a beam experiencing bending. A shell is a structure of any geometric form where
the length and the width are of the same order of magnitude but the thickness of the structure
is considerably smaller. A large diameter, but thin-walled, short tube supported at its ends and
loaded laterally is an example of a shell experiencing bending.
The objective of the experiment is to validate the flexure formula to and to
determine normal stresses at a specific point in a beam. The strain was part of the data given
after the experiment as calculated by the strain gauge, however stress was the required data
so it had to be calculated using youngs modulus.
The known loads were used to determine the reaction forces at the supports.
The bending moment was known throughout the beam so the normal stress was calculated at
specific point along its length. The theoretical stress was determined and compared with the
experimentally measured value which was then used to prove the validity of flexures formula

EXPERIMENTAL SET-UP

RESULTS

Test

Load (L)(Kg)

Load (W)(N)

1
2
3

0.8862
1.3964
2.4168

8.6847
13.6847
23.6847

Strain
()
250x10-6
291x10-6
380x10-6

Reaction A (N)

Reaction B (N)

7.356
10.646
17.226

3.2886
4.9986
8.4186

Load Vs. Strain

20

Load

15

10

0
0.00025

0.000291

0.00038

5
DIAGRAMS

Shear Force Diagram 1 (N)

7.356
5.396

6
4
2
0

0
-2

-3.2887

-4

Shear Force Diagram 2 (N)

10.646

10

8.686

8
6
4
2
0

-2
-4

-4.9987

-6

Shear Force Diagram 3 (N)

17.226
15.266

15
10
5
0
-5
-10

-8.4187

Bending Moment Diagram 1(N.cm-1)

60

121

182

244

305

366

425

486

547

609

670

731

790

851

912

974

851

912

974

Bending Moment Diagram 2 (N.cm-1)

60

121

182

244

305

366

425

486

547

609

670

731

790

Bending Moment Diagram 3

60

121

182

244

305

366

425

486

547

609

670

731

790

851

912

974

8
CALCULATIONS

Experimental

Test
1
2
3

I
0.26x10-9
0.26x10-9
0.26x10-9

M51
0.01253
0.01384
0.02086

theory
48.23x106
53.21x106
80.23x106

experimental
50x106
58.2x106
76x106

ERROR CALCULATIONS
50x106 - 48.23x106 =1.77x106
58.2x106 - 53.21x106=4.99x106
76x106- 80.23x106=-4.23x106

ERROR PERCENTAGE
1.77x106/50x106=3.54%
4.99x106/58.2x106=8.57%
4.23x106/76x106=5.56%

CONCLUSION
From the results obtained in this experiment we can deduce that flexures formula is a suitable
formula with a slight error, the error is due to equipment and human error. The theoretical
stress did not differ very much from the experimental value and this was the fact that validated
the flexure fomula.
The following values were the theoretical stresses N.m-1
48.23x106

53.21x106

80.23x106

9
The following values were the experimental stresses in N.m -1
50x106

58.2x106

76x106

The results for the moment where calculated from the graphs which would have played a
major part in the error, therefore the flexure formula is more accurate than we would expect.