(Figure 9.3) or whether to go with something totally different often arise in support truss designs because of the lack of one totally superior design and the large number of design options [Fuller, 1975] Even with these restraints, methods to quantify and trade different types of truss structures have been attempted with some success. For example, in 1988 Lichwala quantified several box trusses types and attempted to optimize the design (Figure 9.4). This was one of the first attempts to trade-off different types of box trusses, although it was incomplete in examining all the possible box truss types shown in Figure 9.5. Trade-off parameters such as fail-safe characteristics, operational access, and pallet mounting were included as well as the usual engineering parameters such as stiffness and torsional characteristics. The final conclusion reached was that the lattice truss which has all the diagonals crossed when looked at from any of the six box faces (RI. truss) had the best properties overall, although other truss types did have some better characteristics in some areas (Table 9.4). Figure 9.3 All possible box truss configurations that are possible by flipping the diagonal members on each of the six faces.
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