Question:
I'm having a problem with the weight i am getting for the truck, and after talking to two other people they were also having problems with the weight as well. Every time i do the calculations my weight comes out to something 10^9. I am pretty sure that there is no way that the vehicle could weigh that much. I used the maximum strain on the graph of sensor 2, as well as the average for all of the sensors and still got a very large number that seems impossible. How would i take into consideration the weight of the bridge so i can find the mass of the truck only?
Response:
You’re having a problem that is quite common in the real world, and why it’s important to have a “cross-check” on the expected answer. I’m putting several comments below that may help.
- Very often this kind of problem arises from a units issue. Often it has to do with not being consistent (and converting where necessary) between inches and feet.
- Later Addition – Mr. DeVitis reviewed this response and agreed that the problem was probably units. He says “This is certainly a unit issue. The measurements provided are in micro-strain [ue] and need to be converted to strain [e]. Accounting for this, his answer would be ~10,000lbs which is pretty close to the xxxxx lbs I calculated” (JEM deleted his exact answer.
- See the other blog posts for comments about the sensor location
- You should not need to take the weight of the bridge into consideration since the strain measurements start with the bridge already in place.
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