The design of tensile surface structures - From a hand calculation in 1958 to a contemporary numerical simulation

This paper summarizes the differences in the design approaches for tensile surface structures between the earliest structures in the 1950s and today’s practice. Current software tools allow more refined and advanced calculations. Nevertheless, a basic hand calculation can clarify the process in a few pages and provide the appropriate key data. A transparent setup allows the form-finding and structural analysis to be redone. The calculation of the cable net for the bandstand by André Paduart (1958) is analysed in this paper as a case study. Both the hand calculation (19 pages) and the numerical simulation are summarized and the design context of the initial and current calculations are described. The approximations made by Paduart resulted in a remarkably intelligible and coherent evaluation of the cable net structure. The historical approach can still be applied for a first verification of a pretensioned cable net or for a membrane structure as the simplified calculation method is similar.