West Point Bridge Extensions

An excellent way to extend the West Point Bridge Design software is to add your own sets of criteria and constraints. I give the students real-life type situations that they have to follow. This is an example assignment from this year:

You will be designing bridges to meet certain criteria and for different situations. For each bridge you are to design, you will need to keep track of the following in written form:

1. The problem (Hint: You are designing a bridge)
2. Any criteria and constraints for that particular bridge.
3. Your brainstormed ideas
4. Your evaluation of those ideas
5. The design chosen and why
6. The WPBD file
7. The test results
8. Any redesigns you have made (in general. You don't have to write down every single time you changed a member size)
9. If you were successful or not and if not, why?

Bridge #1: This bridge is for our local contest (Code RELC). There are no additional constraints. You are trying to make the cheapest bridge possible. Grades will be given based on placement in our local contest.

Bridge #2: Due to aesthetic reasons, the Copper Canyon Bridge must be built as an arch bridge. The span of the bridge must be no larger than 20 feet. The citizens of Copper Canyon have appropriated $300,000 for the construction of their bridge.

Bridge #3: Due to a mistake at the steel factory, all of the steel sent for the bridge is in 4 meter lengths. You may cut the steel to make shorter members, but no member may be longer than 4 meters. Cost is not a concern, as the steel company will be paying for their mistake. You may change the thickness of the members, as long as you change all of them to the same thickness.

Bridge #4: Due to a material shortage, the Johnson Creek bridge cannot contain more than 125 meters of steel. The town government has also set the minimum deck height at 8 feet to accomodate flat barges that use the creek, as well as a $230,000 maximum cost.

For each bridge, you must have all parts of the design process written (#1-9.)

For the first bridge, I use the Local Contest option. There are no additional constraints other than those imposed by the software itself. The other bridges have added constraints that make them a little more challenging. As with most design projects, there is no "right" answer, but you will find that the more criteria and constraints you add, the more "convergent design" you will have. The students designs will start to look similar.

Just another way to get more use out of an already great (and free) software program

TTFN