Shelves

Designing with Angles and Side-Bent Metal Sheets

• Comments The direct way to set up the shelf is to have 4 angles standing vertically at the 4 corners of the rectangular side-bent metal sheet, angle-to-sheet fastened with screws, at least 1 at each corner. At this point the remaining question is how to support the shelf for rigidity.

Using short flat bars at each corner to produce a small triangular support structure is possible; alternatively wires or long flat bars can diagonally span two angles on a side around their middle sections, producing an X support on each side face (except 1 for accessibility).

Using wires presents assembly problems where tensioning for perpendicular alignment between the angles and the bottom/top platforms is difficult.

The wire and long flat bar X provide minimal resistance against certain torsional forces.

The short flat bars are much more manufacturing-intensive.

It's either short or long flat bars at this point.

Short Flat Bar Design Parameters

• Flat Bar Thickness This value influences the flat bar's rigidity.

• Flat Bar Length This value influences the flat bar's positioning on the shelf, larger values lowering the mechanical advantage that the shelf loads exert on the flat bar but increasing the risk of stress concentration into mechanical advantage at the middle of the flat bar; hence this value influences how much and where the flat bar experiences mechanical stress.

• Flat Bar Width This value influences the flat bar's rigidity. Also (minor) influences where the flat bar is positioned such that it does not stick not out relative to the volume of the remainder of the frame.