Greenhouse structures have been analyzed and designed generally using planar model in Chinese. An essential shortcoming of this type of model is that the spatial effect in the longitudinal direction is not considered. This results in inaccurate design results of the structures. To overcome this shortcoming, a structural design software was proposed based on finite element method with consideration of three-dimensional effect. The software function was introduced and two numerical examples were presented to demonstrate the reasonable results using three-dimensional models. Results using planar and three-dimensional models were compared in respects of strength, stability and lateral displacements.

Greenhouse, structural design software, spatial action, finite element method based model

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