Chapter 6: Energy Methods

Chapter overview

In previous chapters, we’ve studied various types of loadings: axial, torsion, shear and bending. Here in this chapter, we’ll look at the displacement and slope caused by these loadings, by considering the strain energy:

• C6.1 Elastic Strain Energy for Various Loadings - quantifying the strain energy stored due to axial, torsion, shear and bending loadings
• C6.2 Conservation of Energy - applying the energy conservation principle to calculate our displacement and slope
• C6.3 Virtual Work - using a “virtual” load to calculate our displacement and slope at anywhere we want
• C6.4 Castigliano’s Theorem - another method to work out our displacement and slope at any region