Statics › Section G · Centroids and centers of gravity › Topic G.7

Distributed loads

Snow on a roof, books on a shelf and a floor full of people are loads spread along a length rather than forces at a point. Each can be replaced by one resultant force: its size is the area under the load diagram, and it acts through that area's centroid.

In this topic

  • Loads that are spread out
  • Load intensity
  • The equivalent resultant
  • Uniform and triangular loads
  • Worked example: a trapezoidal load
  • Worked example: reactions of a simple beam
  • Worked example: a cantilever
  • Loads given by a function
  • Using resultants correctly
  • Common mistakes to avoid
  • Key takeaways

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