A formulation for large-scale truss optimization

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Description/Abstract

This paper is realted to the optimization of trusses based on the minimum compliance method. There are two basic aims. First to show that the sizing problem of trusses can be cast as a second-order cone programming (SOCP) problem. This is feasible even if we consider multiple load cases and the design has to be basedon the worst case compliance. The benefit is that the problem can be solved easily using a standard software. The second aim is to show that the optimal connectivity can be obtained if we apply a heuristic which is based on SOCP duality. This means that we can simply consider a ground structure with some connections and after the solution of the sizing problem we can add only members which reduce the compliance. In this way we solve a sequence of numerical optimization problems. This is preferable than solving one sizing problem with all possilbe connections as this yields very large numerical optimization problems.