Optimization Procedure SAPOP — A General Tool for Multicriteria Structural Designs

As presented in Chapter 1, it is an important goal of engineering activities to improve and optimize technical designs, structural assemblies and structural components. The task of structural optimization is to support the engineer in searching for the best possible design alternatives of specific structures. The “best possible” or “optimal” structure here applies to that structure which mostly corresponds to the designer’s desired concept and his objectives meeting at the same time operational, manufacturing and application demands. Compared with the “Trial and Error”-method generally used in engineering practice and based on an intuitive empirical approach, the determination of optimal solutions by applying mathematical optimization procedures is more reliable and efficient. These procedures can be expected to be more frequently applied in industrial practice. In order to apply structural optimization methods to an optimization task, both the design objectives and the relevant constraints must be expressed by means of mathematical func­tions. One example of a design objective is the demand for the maximum degree of stiffness of a structure which can be described by the objective “minimization of the maximum structural deformation”. The design variables are the parameters of the structure, for example the cross-sectional and geometrical quantities, which should be selected in a way that the objective function can be minimized by considering additional conditions. These conditions or constraints are equality and inequality equations which include the mathematical formulation of demands such as permissible stresses, stability criteria etc.

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