Study On Load Effect Of The Cylindrical Air-supported Structure

In recent years, air-supported structure is becoming more and more popular inChina, which relates to tennis court, swimming pool, coal storage shed, temporaryoffice and so on. Recently, a survey of Canada on failure of the pneumatic membranestructure refers to most of the air-supported structure destruction is due to membranetearing and the anchor insufficient in the wind, at the same time, it also shows that manylow inflatable structure such as greenhouse collapsed by the accumulation of snow.Therefore, the wind loads and the accumulation of snow loads are two important loadsof pneumatic membrane structure. The paper mainly focuses on wind loads effect andthe accumulated snow loads effect of the cylindrical air-supported structure.Firstly, according to the experimental results of wind pressure coefficients ofcylindrical flexible membrane structures by Canada Pro. N.Turkkan and Pro.N.K.Srivastava, the paper presents the factors of wind loads effect of cylindricalair-supported structure. The factors are wind direction α, internal pressure (ratio pi/q),rise-span ratio H/B, length-width ratio L/B, Reynolds number Re. Draw on the experienceof the thought of wind load area partion on rigid circular model, the paper presents thesimplified wind pressure coefficients of cylindrical pneumatic membrane structurewhich widely used in several common situations.Secondly, combined with the specific calculation model, finite element method(ANSYS) is applied to analyze the influence of wind direction α, internal pressure (ratiopi/q),rise-span ratio H/B on the maximum displacement and the maximum stress.Then, the paper deduces the calculation formula of cylindrical flexible membranestructure vertical ultimate bearing capacity during the snow accumulated in thepneumatic membrane structure. It also discussed the relationship between the vertical ultimate bearing capacity and rise-span ratio H/B, internal pressure pi, membraneweight for engineering reference.Finally, finite element method is applied to analyze the influence of internalpressure pi, rise-span ratio H/B on the maximum displacement and the maximum stresswhen full span, half-span snow loads on the cylindrical air-supported structure.