Deflection of beams

You will have met the ideas of direct stress and strain, and of shear stress and strain. You will
have worked on shear force (SF) and bending moment (BM), and you will have drawn diagrams
of the variation of SF and BM along a loaded beam. You will also have calculated the stresses
due to direct and shear forces and couples. In this lesson we are going to see how we can
manipulate the bending moment equation to estimate the deflection of beams
subjected to simple loading.

In a linearly elastic system the deflection is directly proportional to the load and, in the case of
deflected beams, the bending moment at any section is also directly proportional to the load.

Fortunately it is generally accepted that all typical engineering systems behave linearly for stress
calculation purposes.

Development of principles:

Study Figure 1 for a moment. Here we show the side view of a beam which is loaded in such a way
that it is deflected 'concave upwards'. The thick black line represents the beam in the xy coordinate
system.

Figure 1
𝑑𝑦
Notice how the slope of the deflected beam can be provided through 𝑑𝑥. It is this aspect which feeds
the development of key formulae.

Initial derivation and development, incorporating the bending stress equation which we have used
substantially we arrive at the following equation:

𝑀 𝑑2 𝑦
=
𝐸𝐼 𝑑𝑥 2

This a second order differential equation and provides the basis for our four standard cases of beams
under different loading conditions. The equation above must be integrated once, to discover the
𝑑𝑦
slope (𝑑𝑥 ) and integrated again to find the deflection y.
The task is now to integrate our expression for various beams under different loading conditions.
There are four standard cases of these:

1. Cantilever with a concentrated end load.

2. Cantilever with a uniformly distributed load.

3. Simply supported beam with a central concentrated load.

4. Simply supported beam with a uniformly distributed load.

Cantilever with a concentrated end load:

The area we are interested in, is the slope at the free end and the deflection at the free end:

𝑑𝑦 𝐹𝐿2
Slope at free end 𝑑𝑥
= 2𝐸𝐼

𝐹𝐿3
Deflection at free end 𝑦=−
3𝐸𝐼

Questions:

1. A cantilever beam is 4m long and has a point load of 5kN at the free end. The flexural
stiffness is 53.3MNm-2. Calculate the slope and deflection at the free end.

2. A cantilever beam is 5m long and has a point load of 50kN at the free end. The deflection at
the free end is 3mm downwards. The modulus of elasticity is 205GPa. The beam has a solid
rectangular section with a depth 3 times the width (D=3B). Find:

a) The flexural stiffness

b) The dimensions of the section.
Cantilever with a uniformly distributed load:

Once more, removing the interest in the development of the working equations give us 4 equations
that are useful. If we are to consider the deflection and slope at any point along the beam we can
use the following:

𝑑𝑦 −𝑤𝑥 3 𝑤𝐿3
𝐸𝐼 𝑑𝑥 = 6
+ 6
(1)

−𝑤𝑥 4 𝑤𝐿3 𝑥 𝑤𝐿4

𝐸𝐼𝑦 = + − (2)
24 6 8

The main points of interest are is the slope at the free end and the deflection in the middle. This will
therefore give us the following equation(s):

𝑑𝑦 𝑤𝐿3
Slope at the free end: 𝑑𝑥
= 6𝐸𝐼
(3)

𝑤𝐿4
Deflection at the free end: 𝑦= (4)
8𝐸𝐼

Questions:

3. A cantilever beam is 4m long and has a udl of 300N/m. The flexural stiffness is 60MNm -2.
Calculate the slope and deflection at the free end.

4. A cantilever beam is 5m long and carries a udl of 8kN/m. The modulus of elasticity is 205GPa
and the beam is a solid circular section. Calculate:

a) The flexural stiffness which limits the deflection to 3mm at the free end.

b) The diameter of the beam.

Simply supported beam with a point load in the middle:

The beam is symmetrical so the reactions are F/2. The bending moment equation will change at the
centre position, but because the bending will be symmetrical at each side of the centre we need only
solve for the left side.

Slope and deflection at any point along the beam will give us the following equations:

𝑑𝑦 𝐹𝑥 2 𝐹𝐿2
𝐸𝐼 = − (1)
𝑑𝑥 4 16

𝐹𝑥 3 𝐹𝐿3 𝑥
𝐸𝐼𝑦 = 12
− 16
(2)

As the main points of interest will be the slope at the left hand end and deflection in the middle. The
equation below gives the slope at the left and right hand end, hence the opposing signs. We can
consider the slope to be negative on the left hand side and positive on the right hand side.

𝑑𝑦 𝐹𝐿2
=± (3)
𝑑𝑥 16𝐸𝐼

Deflection at the middle:

𝐹𝐿3
𝑦 = − 48𝐸𝐼 (4)

Questions:

5. A simply supported beam is 8m long with a load of 500kN at the middle. The deflection at
the middle is 2mm downwards. Calculate the gradient at the ends.

6. A simply supported beam is made from a hollow tube 80mm outer diameter and 40mm
inner diameter. It is supported over a span of 6m. A point load of 900N is placed at the
middle. Find the deflection at the middle if E=200 GPa.
Simply supported beam with a uniformly distributed load:

𝐿
In this type of system, the beam is symmetrical, so the reactions are 𝑤. . Also the bending moment
2
at position x can be given by:

𝑤𝑙𝑥 𝑤𝑥 2
𝑀= −
2 2

Presenting the equations that are of use to us, and in the similar manner to previous cases discussed
we arrive at the following:

𝑑𝑦 𝑤𝐿𝑥 2 𝑤𝑥 3 𝑤𝐿3
𝐸𝐼 = − − (1)
𝑑𝑥 4 6 24

𝑤𝐿𝑥 3 𝑤𝑥 4 𝑤𝐿3
𝐸𝐼𝑦 = − + (2)
12 24 24

As with the previous instance, the slope at the left hand side is equal in size to that of the right hand
side, but separated by sign.

Slope at the free end:

𝑑𝑦 𝑤𝐿3
𝑑𝑥
= ± 24𝐸𝐼 (3)

Deflection in the middle:

5𝑤𝐿4
𝑦 = − 384𝐸𝐼 (4)

Questions:

7. A simply supported beam is 8m long with a udl of 5000N/m. Calculate the flexural stiffness
which limits the deflection to 2mm at the middle. Calculate the gradient at the ends.

8. A simply supported beam is made from a hollow tube 80mm outer diameter and 40mm
inner diameter. It is supported over a span of 6m. The density of the metal is 7300kg/m3.
E=200 GPa. Find the deflection at the middle due to the weight of the beam.
The theory of superposition:

The theory states that the slope and deflection of a beam at any point is the sum of the slopes and
deflections which would be produced by each load acting on its own. For beams with combinations
of loads which are standard cases, we need only use the standard formulae.

Attempt the following question to see if you understand….

A cantilever beam is 4m long with a flexural stiffness of 20MN-2. It has a point load of 1kN at the free
end and a udl of 300N/m along its entire length. Calculate the slope and deflection at the free end.