CALCULATION METHOD AND PARAMETRIC ANALYSIS OF PRESTRESS DISTRIBUTION FOR CABLE DOMES WITH SPATIAL THREE-STRUTS AND DOUBLE-HOOP CABLES CONSIDERING THE SELF-WEIGHT

Based on the simplicity and the insufficiency of the mechanical properties of traditional cable domes, a spatial three-strut and double-hoop cable dome was proposed. A method for calculating the prestress of the struts and cables which integrated the displacement method and the nodal equilibrium method was proposed to calculate and compare the difference of prestress distribution of the cable domes under the conditions of considering self-weight or not. Calculation tables of the prestress were given and the influence of various parameters on the structural performance was compared under different parameters. The results showed that the prestress values for most members increased in various degrees when the self-weight was considered, that the increase of the strut height and span ratio would reduce the initial prestress of almost all the members in the cable dome, and that the increase of the strut height had more significant effects than that of the increase of the span ratio. Therefore, the scheme of increasing the strut height was more often adopted in engineering practice.