Honestly Im New and Have No Idea What's Its Called (Support?)
Posted: April 25th, 2018, 6:37 am
For the Xs that we add to strengthen the tower, why do we use Xs? Why not Ws or any other support systems?
Ok... So, therte are basically 2 different methods of bracing... X's and Z's... Sorry, no W's allowed... Save those for bridges or Booms...minnietran wrote:For the Xs that we add to strengthen the tower, why do we use Xs? Why not Ws or any other support systems?
X braces will resist only tensile forces, not compressive forces. Think of a string... Very strong when both ends are pulled in opposite directions... Very weak when both ends are pushed toward each other. This is why we use an X pattern. Neither piece of the X is worth a hoot when put in compression, bot the other half is put in tension when this happens and covers for the compressive weakness of the other piece, and same in reverse.
In a Z brace situation, there is only 1 diagonal piece to resist both compressive and tensile forces. When resisting tensile forces, length doesn't matter... Whether it is 10 cm or 100 cm, the same size piece will adequately brace equally well when in tension. When in compression, the longer the piece is, the bigger, heavier, denser it needs to be. It doesn't need to be very long before a Z brace can get 5 to 10 times larger than the members of an X brace.