Mechanics of Materials [Hardcover]

James M. Gere (Author), Stephen P. Timoshenko (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0534934293 | ISBN-13: 978-0534934293 | Publication Date: May 1997 | Edition: 4th

This volume emphasizes the fundamental concepts and applications of strength of materials while developing students' analytical and problem solving skills. This edition has been revised to include more teaching detail in the text, explanations and worked examples, a more natural and logical topic sequence, improved illustrations, and enhanced problem sets.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 912 pages
• Publisher: Pws Pub Co; 4th edition (May 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0534934293
• ISBN-13: 978-0534934293
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 8.1 x 2.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #557,147 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent for beginning students, January 30, 2002

By 

"bervin10" (Champaign, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mechanics of Materials (Hardcover)

I guess I can see some criticism from a mechanical enineers point of view for lack of fatigue failure analysis. But this book is mainly written for the beginning undergraduate for stress and strain analyis. It is by far one of the handiest and most well written books on the subject that I have come across. If you want fatigue life buy a Shigley book. If you want the basic understanding, Timoshenko is wonderful.

21 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Beams, Beams, and more Beams, July 17, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Mechanics of Materials (Hardcover)

I know that this is considered THE mechanics of materials textbook. And paging through it, you can see that the text and figures are very well done, with every effort made to make the material clearly accessible. So in this respect, the book shines. My main objection with this text is its content. Every imaginable method of beam analysis is presented, and the tendency is to treat every stress problem as some sort of beam. Thus if you're a civil engineer designing beams, you'll probably like this book. But if you are a mechanical engineer, responsible for designing mating parts with complex geometries, you'll be sorrily disappointed. Mechanical parts in the real world are not prismatic beams, perfect cylinders, and other utopian forms. They have threads, fillets, holes and other discontinuities that produce stress concentrations -- stress concentrations that have devastating effects in fatigue if not properly accounted for. I know that some will say "Hey, if you want fatigue analysis, get a Machine Design text". But come on, let's be realistic. Many undergrad students will never go on to take such a course, and the fact that well over 90% of real world failures are fatigue failures necessitates that more than 10 pages out of 900 be dedicated to this subject. Also, there is little if any coverage on 3-dimensional stress, plate and shell theory, plasticity, tensors, and a ton of other stuff that is not overly complex, but is used everywhere in the real world. I don't care how "elementary" the book claims to be. If it's over 900 pages, it should cover these important topics. Maybe someday we'll have more practicing engineers writing textbooks -- textbooks that treat real life problems, rather than fictional, academic idealizations.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Fundamental Mechanics Book You Can Buy, December 13, 2008

By 

K. Lyman "Paul D Trigger" (Bozeman, MT) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mechanics of Materials (Hardcover)

Have used this book as a resource for many classes. All of my professors said this is "The Book" for basic Mechanics, and I would agree with them.

Granted, Fatigue, Failure are Buckling analysis are fairly limited. Other advanced topics such as vibrations, FEM and plate theory are not covered. That's because this is a fundamental text, but don't let that fool you. The depth covered and the clarity of presentation is amazing for a Mechanics textbook.

If your looking for more complex analysis, get one of Timoshenko's books (the father of modern mechanics). Really, this book is primarily Timoshenko's work, Gere helps make it understandable. For the FEM, a good book is a difficult find.

This is the best selling Mechanics book for a reason. There has only been minor changes since the original Timoshenko-Gere 1972 version. If your professor does not use this book, he has not been teaching long enough.