RISA Moving Loads

[Structural noob]

Hello All,

This is my first question on this forum and I hope I can contribute to the Structural Engineering community by helping others whenever I can and hopefully getting my own questions answered.

I am trying to apply a uniform distributed load as a moving load and I know that I can convert it to a point load but I want to apply it as a distributed load to simplify my model. Is there any way I can apply a UDL as a moving load in RISA 3-D Version 15?

Thank you,
Karan

 

[dauwerda]

I believe the best you could do is multiple point loads evenly spaced over whatever length your distributed load is.

 

[Structural noob]

Thank you, I was thinking about doing that. Guess that is the only way!

 

[JoshPlumSE]

Karan -

Yes, you need to create a moving load pattern that consists of a series of point loads that approximate your distributed load. You can create up to 50 point loads for the moving load pattern. Therefore, if you had a distributed load of 1 k/ft over a length of 10 ft (for a total load of 10 kips), you could create a series of 50 point loads of 20lbs each 0.2 ft from each other to approximate your distributed load.

 

[Structural noob]

JoshPlum - I agree. But in your example, shouldn't the point loads be 200 lbs each to get a total of 50*200lbs = 10,000 lbs which would be the total load?

 

[JoshPlumSE]

Yup.... I had the math wrong. Just wrote it out too quickly. Also, the spacing should be 0.204 ft since the first load would be at location 0.

But, you get the basic idea.