Challenge

Build Trusses & Spaceframes

Photo of a simple Warren truss with five equilateral triangles bridging a railway line
Wills Creek Bollman Bridge, a Warren truss spanning railway tracks at Meyersdale, Somerset County, Pennsylvania, USA. From the Historic American Engineering Record at the Library of Congress

Build models of practical load bearing structures.

  • What is triangulation and why is it important in structural engineering?
  • What is the difference between a truss and a space frame?
  • What are Warren, Pratt, and Howe Trusses?
  • Who invented the Tetrahedral Truss? And the Octet Truss? For what purposes?
  • What forces are trusses subject to? How can you test the strength and stiffness of trusses?
  • What does statical determinacy mean? What are the benefits of statically determinate and statically indeterminate structures?
  • How could you strengthen ExaPlex structures?

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