AN ACTIVE STRUT STRETCHING APPROACH FOR FORM FINDING OF TENSEGRITY MEMBRANE STRUCTURES

This study presents a new form finding method for tensegrity membrane structures. The form finding problem is formulated as an unconstrained nonlinear programming problem, where the total potential energy of a structure composed of strut and membrane elements is minimized. The strut element can function as a truss element or as an element that shows constant stress irrespectively of its nodal displacements. The active strut stretching approach can be described as follows: Strut elements are set as constant compression elements, which is equivalent to stretching its undeformed length. As a consequence, the membrane connected to these strut elements has to deform such that the forces introduced by the constant compression elements are equilibrated. Several examples are presented with sufficient information to be reproduced by other authors.