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Lateral load 1

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dgkhan

Structural
Jul 30, 2007
322
I have to design a wall to contain 24 feet high recycled paper bales. Each bale is 3 feet high. What would be the load these stacked bales will exert on wall
 
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I would assume that if properly stacked the load would be very small, but I suspect they are not properly stacked. Therefore, as an engineer you need a comfortable design value. This is essentially a soil retaining wall problem, so Ko x H x (gamma) would be a way to determine the pressure. But what is Ko?

Well how about another idea:

Consider a wall of stacked cylinders. The cylinder above has a weight, W, which acts on the two cylinders below with a normal force, N, on each. These normal forces act at an angle 30 degrees away from straight up. These forces act toward each other to create horizontal equilibrium. The vertical component of each normal force is 0.5 x W. The horizontal force is 0.29 x W. This can be converted into a Ko value.

This logic assumes perfectly round, tightly packed particles. The bundles, are likely to be less prone to exerting horizontal forces than perfectly round particles, so long as they remain in bundles. Once the binding is removed, then we are considering the individual sheets sliding over each other. I don't know how to solve that problem, but I know Ko can never exceed 1.0.

Good Luck.
 
I was thinking on similar lines. I am using 10% of the total vertical load.
 
What about impact load when the bales are placed. I would definately think this needs to be considered.

Maybe look up the barrier loads for carparks and adjust the details to suit.

csd
 
dgkhan,
Most waste paper bales are very irregular and extremely unstable. If the bales are stacked 24' high that is 8 bales at 3' per bale. My experience (in a prior life)as a manager of a large integrated pulp & paper mill sez that you can be assured that these stacks will fall against the walls. Therefore, I would recommend that you install heavy timber "bumpers" on the side of the walls and design the walls for the impact of the bales falling from the top of the stacks or for a 24' high stack of bale to fall against the wall.
To get a better idea of what you are dealing with you might visit a waste paper recycling business in your area.
Good luck
 
Use Ko of 0.5 and paper at density of 42 lbs/cubic foot. This will be worst case, (static), if the bales break. Agree with OldPaperMaker for impact factor needed.
 
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