Homework Assignments
January Homework Assignments
The submission term for the January Homework Assigment has expired
You can look at the solutions, 2 DOF System, Support Motion and Rayleigh Quotient.
I'd like to show you also an alternative procedure for the solution of the first problem.
The January Homework Assigment has been published.
To be admitted to February exams you must submit your solutions not later than January 31st and score more than 60 points over a maximum of 100.
Detailed instructions are enclosed in the text of the assignment.
August Homework Assignment
The August Homework Assigment's term has expired.
The solutions of the exercises are now partially available.
The solution of the Isolation problem will folllow soon.
The August Homework Assigment has been published.
To be admitted to September exams you must submit your solutions not later than August 31st and score more than 60 points over a maximum of 110.
Detailed instructions are enclosed in the text of the assignment.
June Homework Assignment
The June Homework Assigment's term has expired.
The solutions of the exercises are now partially available.
The solution of the Impact problem will folllow soon.
Objectives
The course deals with the dynamical response of mechanical systems, linear and non-linear, under the assumption of small displacements.
Focus is given to
- analytical and numerical methods for the integration of the equations of motion, both in time and in frequency domain,
- the numerical methods for the eigen-analysis of multiple degrees of freedom systems and
- earthquake engineering applications.
Organization
This year we'll have 13 or 14 weekly classes, inclusive of tutorials and computational exercises.
All the slides used in classes will be (almost) immediately made available on this page after each class.
If you want to have a look at the slides before a class, last year's slides are still available. Remember, however, that I'm still slowly changing the content and the organization of my lessons and that the reference material is only what I post here.
Exam
The exam is based on an oral test and a preliminary written test.The oral test consists in a discussion of a few of the topics that we have touched during our classes.
The preliminar written test consists in a homework, comprising a variable number of problems, assigned ten days or so in advance of the exam call.
The final mark will be based mainly on the oral test.
Recommended books
- Ray W. Clough, Joseph Penzien,
Dynamics of Structures.
This classic text is sold solely by the software house linked above. You can find an used copy with a bit of luck. - Anil K.Chopra, Dynamics of Structures (Theory and Applications to Earthquake Engineering), 4th ed.
The first part of the course follows Clough and Penzien's book, the second part follows Chopra's. Should you prefer to buy a single book, my advice is buy Chopra's.
Note that a fair number of copies of Chopra's book (3rd ed.) are available from the campus library in Lecco, note also that Chopra's 2nd and 3rd editions are widely available at lower prices and are perfectly appropriate for my course.
Homeworks
Each homework comprises a set of exercises. While many of these exercises won't require more than paper, pencil and a hand-held calculator, the remaining ones will require plotting a time series or a bit of really elementary matrix algebra, i.e., things that every half-decent spreadsheet can do. Of course specialized programs, let's say Mathematica, Matlab or Matlab's free clone Octave can be helpful, to say the least...
A pleasant alternative to proprietary stuff is the IPython notebook, an example of which is the solution of an exercise I've assigned in 2012.