What Are Simply Supported Beams?

 A simply supported beam is a beam structure that is simply placed over the supports at its two ends. It is also called as freely supported beam and holds the simplest arrangement compared to all other beam support arrangements.

Supports for Simply Supported Beams

The supports used for simply supported beams can be either roller support or pinned support. Both the roller and pinned support for beam ends permit rotational movement. It restricts the vertical and horizontal movement.

Load Action in Simply Supported Beams

A simple supported beam undergo bending and shear action under the action of external loads. The supports of simply supported beam, as explained before, do not permit the translational movement.

Simply supported beam under the action of loads creates bending moment and shear force under the action of these loads. The intensity of these stresses created in the beam is dependent on the type of load over it. It can be either a point load or uniformly distributed load along the span of the beam. 

A simply supported beam is modeled mathematically as having zero moments at the supports.