How to determine the EFFECTIVE PROJECTED AREA (EPA) of a lighting pole

[SilverBeam75]

Hi,

I have an aluminium pole section (4x4x0.25) 24ft high with a 12" cantilevar fixture that will hold the lighting. I need to find the maximum EFFECTIVE PROJECTED AREA (EPA). Do I need to find the the maximum EPA versus the strenght of my pole or is it a limitation of displacement of the pole. If the horizontal limitation is L/50 and the vertical is L/100, do I only need to find the EPA not exceeding this displacements ?

It is not clear for me how the design should be done...

Anyone has experience with pole design ?

thank you,

 

[JedClampett]

If you go to the manufacturer's catalogue, they should give this. I've done a number of poles and I could always find it. If the manufacturer doesn't provide it, reply and I'll look in our sparky's catalogues. Note that in a pinch, you can assume that a pole is a pole and one manufacturer has the same value as another for a 25 ft tall 4 x 4 x .25 pole.

 

[SilverBeam75]

Hello JedClampett,

I want to know how you calculate it, what is the design philosophy. I'm in a learning/design process. Let say you are hired by a manufacturer to analyse and determine the EPA of his 5x5x0.25 pole. How will you design it ?

 

[JedClampett]

I'm not sure whether deflection or stress controls. If it's stress, I suspect that the anchorage controls. I know that the EPA reduces as the wind increases which makes sense. They might perform testing for all I know.
I'm also unsure how they assume the EPA is distributed, whether it's all at the top of the pole or patterned somehow.
I don't know where this question is coming from. If you worked for a company that provides light poles, I'm sure they have standards that they design to. It's unlikely that they would leave it up to someone to figure out.

 

[enko]

I have been working with mobile telecomunications antennas which consist of vertical tubular poles from 4m to 8 m installed on the rooftops of buildings.
I don't know if this can help but we calculate the EPA first as a function of the section dimensions of the pole.Then we check the displacement which shouldn't surpass the criterias given by the technical functionaliy datas of the cell antennas