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Creators/Authors contains: "Thwala, Menzi"

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  1. Structural integrity of built environment is key to ensure long lasting infrastructure that serve their respective purpose. This report serves to explore elements that factor in structural dynamics. The elements range from angular motion, reciprocating motion, and structural dynamics concepts of resonance and damping. This investigation uses 3D printing of models to gain a concrete understanding of these concepts through a series of three challenges. Challenge 1 focuses on design and testing of a wheel to obtain minimum angular acceleration. Challenge 2 focuses on the design and testing of reciprocating motion devices that would later be used for Challenge 3. Challenge 3 investigates how mass and stiffness of structural columns affect the natural frequency of a structure. This challenge incorporates angular motion and reciprocating motion concepts to subject a designed structure to forced and free vibration. Challenge 1 results show that mass concentrated further from the axis of rotation reduce the angular acceleration of an object in angular motion. Challenge 2 reveals that translating reciprocating motion to linear motion can be mathematically modelled and the responses largely depend on the reciprocating motion device. Challenge 3 reveals that real life structures exhibit lightly damped conditions and reach a point of failure at high displacements at resonance. 
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