Re: How to learn to solve structural steel requirements?
Over the years I have seen many an engineered project fail in actual practice. Now you can say well no one ever thought they were going to use it in mud, or that no one thought the plywood they were rolling it on would have given way like that. Or the cement that was supporting it would have cracked. But in reality that is just the stuff you have to think about. I was just in a newly built laundromat, instead of a six-inch pour for a floor, they got away with a four-inch pour. I was mounting a change machine base I made, to the floor for a friend, and I hit the dirt at 3 1/2 inches twice, and 4 inches two other times. The floor had already started to sink, crack and become unlevel.
Whenever anything moves, it has to be overbuilt, for reasons like the above. You have to be a pessimist and expect the worst; most young people in college are not up to thinking like that; they want happy thoughts. You also have to have in the shop, and in the field experience working with the tools and equipment that you wish to build. Otherwise, do not bother.
Years ago I built arched gusset "A" frames to lift boats in the warehouse. We used them for a year with no issues and even misused them with no issues, then someone either too lazy or just not too savvy locked the wheels on the "A" frame straight, as he was misusing them to move a boat with a forklift. The legs of the "A" frame tracked apart and set the ocean racer, on the ground as the "A" frame plastically deformed. No damage to the boat, but the "A" frame was toast. It could have been worse. You cannot expect common sense. And at some point, you have to agree to kill someone that is lacking common sense, to an extreme degree.
The reason we put locking wheels on the "A" frame was so we could aim the "A" frame unloaded at the place we wanted it to end up and then lock the wheels, we could push it from only one side of the "A" frame and move it to where we wanted it to go. We had warned all involved never to lock all four wheels under a load. But you know how good advice falls on deaf ears.
If I wasn't so.....crazy, I wouldn't try to act normal, and you would be afraid.