Theoretical And Experimental Research On A New Spatial Structure Composed Of Cable Dome And Single-Layer Lattice Shell

Cable dome, which was first proposed by Geiger, is known as the most successful application of tensegrity system conceived by Fuller. The most notable feature of the cable dome is high structural efficiency. The cable dome with laying membrane exists the disadvantages as follows: high price, low fireproof performance, big rain noise, poor thermal insulation property and complicated cutting pattern. These disadvantages seriously hinder project application of the cable dome system. To overcome the disadvantages of the cable dome, this paper proposed a new spatial structure composed of cable dome and single-layer lattice shell. The composite structure makes full use of mechanical characteristic of cable dome and easily laying rigid roof board of single-layer lattice shell. The composite structure is studied systematically from two aspects both in theory and experiment.Chapter 1 briefly summarizes the classifications of long-span spatial structures. Development history, project applications and research status of cable domes are studied and research contents of this paper are determined.Chapter 2 gives the classifications of the composite structure and proposes 6 types of composition forms applied in different types of long-span spatial structures.In chapter 3, assuming self-weight of cables, struts and joints as equivalent nodal loads and based on the nodal equilibrium equations, the general equations for computing the actual initial prestress of Geiger and Levy cable domes with and without inner hoops are deduced. Followed that, the process for prestress design of cable dome is presented.In chapter 4, load transfer coefficients of the bars connected cable dome with single-layer lattice shell, support vertical reaction distribution coefficients of cable dome and single-layer lattice shell are defined. A structure composed of Levy cable dome and sun-flower-patterned single-layer lattice shell is taken as an example and its static behaviour under uniform load and concentrated load are analyzed. The effects of prestress distribution, prestress level, shell member section, rise-span ratio, support radial stiffness and composition form on static behaviour of the composite structure are studied.In chapter 5, by parameter study including prestress distribution, prestress level, shell member section, rise-span ratio, support radial stiffness, initial imperfection, load distribution form and material nonlinearity, eigenvalue buckling analysis and nonlinear buckling analysis of the composite structure are conducted. Economic performance on four types of single-layer lattice shell, double-layer lattice shell, suspendome and the composite structure are compared.In chapter 6, dynamic charactiscs of the composite structure is studied. Simulation of wind pressure distribution on long-span sphere shell structure is carried out. Numerical simulated wind speed time series is employed to investigate the wind-induced vibration of the composite structure and typical seismic record El-Centro wave is employed to investigate seismic responses of the composite structure under multi-dimensional and multi-point excitations.In chapter 7, a new spatial structure composed of cable dome and single-layer lattice shell is designed. Experiments on prestress tensioning of cable dome, static behavior of structure under full-span and half-span load are carried out. According to the experiment results, the computation model of the experiment model is modified. The results between the experimental data and theoretical analysis of the structure are compared and analyzed.In the last chapter, all the research results are summarized. Some problems that will be solved in the future are listed.