Cable - A strong rope, usually made of metal, designed to have great tensile strength and to be used in structures.
- Centroid - The geometric center of an area.
- Compression Force - A body subjected to a push.
- Concurrent Force Systems - A force system where all of the forces are applied at a common point on the body or having their lines of action with a common intersection point.
- Cross-Sectional Area - A surface or shape exposed by making a straight cut through something at right angles to the axis.
- Direction - The direction of a vector is defined by the angle between a reference axis and the arrow’s line of direction.
- Fixed Support - A support that prevents translation and rotation in a beam.
- Flange - A broad ridge or pair of ridges projecting at a right angle from the edge of a structural shape in order to strengthen or stiffen it.
- Free Body Diagram - A diagram used to isolate a body from its environment, showing all external forces acting upon it.
- Gusset - A plate or bracket for strengthening an angle in framework.
- Joint - The connection points of members of a truss.
- Magnitude - The absolute value of a number.
- Member - Slender straight pieces of a truss connected by joints.
- Method of Joints - A method of analysis of trusses which constructs free body diagrams of each joint and determines the forces acting in that joint by considering equilibrium of the joint pin.
- Moment - The turning effect of a force about a point equal to the magnitude of the force times the perpendicular distance from the point to the line of action from the force.
- Moment of Inertia - A mathematical property of a cross section that is concerned with a surface area and how that area is distributed about a centroidal axis.
- Newton’s First Law - Every body or particle continues at a state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces acting upon it.
- Newton’s Second Law - The change of motion of the body is proportional to the net force imposed on the body and is in the direction of the net force.
- Newton’s Third Law - If one body exerts a force on a second body, then the second body exerts a force on the first body which is equal in magnitude, opposite in direction, and collinear.
- Pinned Support - A support that prevents translation in any direction.
- Planar Truss - A truss that lies in a single plane often used to support roofs and bridges.
- Resultant Force - The resultant of a system of force is the vector sum of all forces.
- Roller Support - A support that only prevents a beam from translating in one direction.
- Scalar - A physical quantity that has magnitude only.
- Sense - The sense of a vector is the direction of the vector relative to its path and indicated by the location of the arrow.
- Simple Truss - A truss composed of triangles, which will retain its shape even when removed from supports.
- Static Equilibrium - A condition where there are no net external forces acting upon a particle or rigid body and the body remains at rest or continues at a constant velocity.
- Statically Indeterminate - A structure or body which is over-constrained such that there are more unknown supports than there are equations of static equilibrium.
- Structure - Something made up of interdependent parts in a definite pattern of organization, such as trusses, frames, or machines.
- Tension Force - A body subjected to a pull.
- Vector Quantity - A quantity that has both a magnitude and direction.