Figure 1. From the Script Editor in Scia Design Form Builder the input dialogs and calculations are automatically created.
In most civil/structural engineering design software, checks are “black box.” When you run a check, you get a pass/fail result, but what does this really mean? What formulas or methods is the software using to derive the result? How can I verify the check?
What happens if your engineering judgment is different from what the software provides? Or, you need a check that your software doesn’t support?
This lack of transparency and the inability of engineers to easily extend the design capability of their Finite Element Analysis (FEA) software are two problems Nemetschek Scia is addressing with their new, “Open Check” technology: Scia Design Forms.
Scia Design Forms is a mathematical scripting program, much like MathCAD, Mathematica, or MATLAB, but tuned to create civil engineering calculations. For example, unlike general-purpose mathematical programs, Scia Design Forms supports construction units (e.g., imperial and metric) and ships with predefined databases of materials, profile libraries, and nut and bolts to name a few. Using this predefined civil content, engineers can quickly script engineering calculations that can run as stand-alone checks or be integrated into an FEA workflow.
“Giving engineers the ability to write their own checks in their FEA software is a real game changer for some firms,” says Dan Monaghan, U.S. managing director at Nemetschek Scia. “Engineers are no longer limited to the checks that a particular software vendor provides. They can easily extend their FEA workflow to support all the checks the firm may need.”
In a typical engineering office you’ll find multiple structural design software being used, as well as stand-alone checks created in software like Excel other mathematical programs. The result is a disjointed design process where disparate results from the various programs have to be manually coordinated. Not only is this workflow inefficient, but it can also lead to manual coordination errors and, even worse, make it difficult to get a real understanding of the overall behavior of a structure.
Figure 2. Standalone Column Base Plate & Anchor Bolt design check according to AISC 360-10 & ACI 318-11 Appendix D.
Benjamin Follett, a structural engineer at Nemetschek Scia, formerly with Michael Baker International. “At Michael Baker, we all performed one-off MathCAD or Excel checks," he says. "Some engineers even created a library of checks using these software tools. But not being able to integrate them into larger building models was a problem. Not have a final design or checking system meant additional work in the back end of the process.”
Engineering calculations created in Scia Design Forms can be run as stand-alone checks or linked to Scia Engineer, Nemetschek's flagship 3D structural analysis program. When linked, input values for a given calculation (e.g., geometries, loads, internal forces, etc.) can be pulled directly from the 3D FEA analysis model. Results from the calculation are displayed graphically on the 3D model, and the detailed calculation output can be integrated into the Scia Engineering calculation report. This detailed calculation output is completely transparent.
“Transparency means that users can see and verify the mathematics, the references to the codes (articles), the algorithms, and the results, both numerically and graphically. It keeps engineer in control, as they can see exactly what the software is doing when it performs a check,” says Monaghan.
Figure 3. Results from a custom glulam beams check appear graphically on the FEA model and in detail in the engineering report.
Figure 4. Preconfigured Steel Profile Library. One of many civil content libraries that ship with Scia Design Forms.
Best of all, if engineers do not agree with the way the check is written, they can edit the Design Form to make it work exactly how they want. And, if a check is missing they can added it. In this way, Scia Engineer is more than a “box of software” but rather a platform upon which firms can centralize their design tasks into one integrated workflow and consolidate the number of engineering design programs they need to support and maintain.
“We just completed a workflow integration project where we linked our sales/quoting system to Scia Engineer,” says Nathan Bissonnette, engineer at Frazier Industrial, a manufacturer of industrial storage racking systems. “The key to the workflow is applying our own methods to create custom checks for steel storage racks, particularly seismic checks. With Scia Design Forms link to Scia Engineer, we were able to integrate our custom checks directly into our FEA workflow, producing an accurate design document and saving time in the process. We could not do this easily with any other technology."
For More Information:
Users can explore Scia Design Forms by requesting a free tryout edition: http://nemetschek-scia.com/en/forms/tryout-request-form
Nemetschek Scia has sponsored promotion of their software Scia Design Forms on ENGINEERING.com.