Tension and Deformation Analysis of Suspension Cable of Flexible Photovoltaic Support under Concentrated Load with Small Rise-span Ratio

The suspension cable structure with a small rise-span ratio (less than 1/30) is adopted in the flexible photovoltaic support, and it has strong geometric nonlinearity. Based on the principle of energy, the increment of cable force and the change of cable displacement under concentrated force are derived for the suspension cable in an equilibrium state under uniform distributed load, and the equivalent bending stiffness of simply supported beam under bending is given. Considering the strain energy generated by cable force variation, the method presented in the paper has higher calculation accuracy for suspension cable structures with a small rise-span ratio, and includes the special case of a large rise-span ratio. An engineering example of flexible photovoltaic support with a span of 15m is calculated and analyzed, and then compared with the finite element calculation results. The results show that the calculation error is less than 1% when the rise is 0.4 m, and the calculation error is less than 3% when the rise is 1.5m. The calculation formula in the paper is simple and accurate, which can provide a reference for static analysis and structural design of flexible photovoltaic support.