Net section — where it appears
The hole that multiplies the stress by three
The stress at the side of a hole is three times the applied stress whatever the hole's size, and at the top and bottom of the same hole it is minus one times it — compression in a plate that nothing is pushing.
The metal between the holes, which comes out as a block
A bolted end connection can fail without a single bolt breaking and without the plate reaching its tensile strength anywhere. A block of metal simply comes out, bounded by two surfaces with two different strengths on them.
The tear that goes diagonally, and the correction that has no derivation
Stagger the holes so that no straight line crosses more than one and the plate does not get its strength back. The tear runs at an angle instead, and the arithmetic that makes it come out right is a century-old piece of curve-fitting nobody has improved on.
The angle that uses half of itself
Bolt an angle through one leg and the other leg is not fully working. The correction is one over a length — both halves of it are geometry, neither involves a material, and a two-bolt connection throws away a quarter of the section.
Named alongside it
The objects these essays reach for when they reach for this one.
ConnectionDuctilityEfficiencyLoad pathSaint-Venant's principleShear planeUltimate strengthBlock shearBolt groupCentroidEccentricityElasticity