Prestressed concrete

[buddhasarah]

Hello, Is there way to model a prestressed concrete beam with a curved tensile cable inside?

Thank you in advance!

[vesna]

There is no way in OpenSees to define curved cable, but you can use several truss or corotational truss elements (whichever you find more appropriate) to approximately model the curved cable.

[buddhasarah]

Thank you very much dear vesna, your advice does help alot ^^*

[oleviuqserh]

Dear Vesna,

When you say that curved cable can be modeled using several truss elements, this means the beam must be modeled with a bundle of shell-elements (ShellMITC4 perhaps?) or aproximating the beam with a strut-and-tie model? If neither is the case, how can we connect these truss elements (curved cable) with the forceBeamColumn elements that actually represent the beam?

Thank you.