ASPECTS REGARDING THE MODELING AND THE FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS FOR THE STRUCTURAL ELEMENTS OF A SCAFFOLD

Under the general name of are understood the constructions composed of pipes, joining parts and their accessories, with which auxiliary constructions are executed that serve to execute the final ones, after which they are dismantled and the material is stored until a new use. The consecrated material for these constructions was wood. Along with the advance taken by the final civil and industrial constructions, the need to replace wood with metal material appeared. The use of metal brought a series of advantages and the achievements with the help of metallic materials proved remarkable. At the moment, the basic elements of these constructions are mild steel pipes, assembled with joints pieces and removable accessories, thus constituting a metal structure that can be used in the most varied forms. In this way, unlike the definitive metal constructions in which the sections of the constituent elements each correspond exactly to the effort it must withstand, at the temporary constructions the problem is solved by an easy-to-manipulate material, with elements that can be changed between them. Within the frame of this work, it is wanted to address two aspects, namely: the general behavior of a temporary auxiliary construction made of steel pipes (scaffold type) under the action of functional loads; the analysis of a joining element from the scaffold componency, an element that allows the assembly of two pipes in orthogonal directions. The approach to the two aspects mentioned was possible using tools made available by a specialized software of finite element analysis namely Femap.