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The soft sweet in the photos can be easily deformed because it is elastic. With objects made of more rigid material, the deformation is less obvious. When you are trying to find out what kind of force is acting on a structure, imagine that the material was more elastic and then think about what kind of deformation would be produced.
If we pull one of our fingers, bend it backwards, or push our palms together, we can feel a tension that grows as we pull, bend or push harder.
We also notice that the feeling is different in each case because we have applied force in a different way each time.
We classify stress by the deformation it produces: traction, compression, bending, torsion and shearing or cutting.
- traction to stretch a body.
- compression to crush or compress a body.
- bending to bend a body.
- torsion to twist a body.
- shearing or cutting to cut a body.
Activity 9
What kind of stress do the legs of a chair bear? When is the stressgreater: when you or someone heavier than you sits on a chair?
Activity 10
What is the best way to break a piece of uncooked spaghetti: by stretching or bending it? What kind of force is acting on the piece of spaghetti in each case?
Activity 11
Listen and decide what kind of force is applied in each case and what stress each object bears.
Activity 12
Look at the photo. Analyse the stress that the bridge will bear if a heavy load is in the middle. How would the different parts of the bridge deform?