Wire suspension bridge analyzed considering suspenders deformation

Elastic theory is employed for short span suspension bridges while deflection theory and finite element theory are used for long span suspension bridges. But the tension deformations of the suspenders are usually ignored in the elastic theory when to compute the internal force of small span suspension bridge. In this paper, a flexibility method considering suspenders deformation was proposed to calculate the internal load of a wire suspension bridge. Its span is less than 200 meters and can be analyzed with elastic theory. Results indicate that the horizontal cable tension force of wire suspension bridge by flexibility method ignoring the suspenders deformations is 0.01671% bigger than the real redundant bar force by flexibility method considering the suspenders deformations. A new equation considering suspenders deformation based on the old common equation was established to find the more accurate horizontal tension force at cable midpoint.