UK to US Steelwork Conversion

Hi Group,

I have a couple of questions for our American colleagues.

I have been approached by a customer with a query regarding the
manufacture of a large welded steel access platform. At present
the drawings exist in AutoCAD dwg format and use metric steel
sizes and dimensions and European sheet sizes (A3 through A0).

Amongst his requirements is a need to 'convert' the drawings to
US standards for possible manufacture in the US/Canada.

I appreciate the US use imperial dimensioning, but, on this
type of drawing would fractional dimensions be shown in decimal
or as actual fractions?

What are the general steelwork standards (Materials & fixings)
in use in the US?

With regard to drawing sheet sizes, would I be correct in
assuming European sheet sizes A4, A3, A2, A1 & A0 roughly
correspond to US sheet sizes A, B, C, D & E?

The customer has also expressed a wish to use Tekla XSteel to
produce new drawings. Is this software widely used in the US
design world or could someone suggest a more widely used
software package for the US market?

TIA

Jim Stevenson
Abacad Design

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In general, steel construction in the US is standardized by the American
Institute of Steel Construction (AISC). Take a look at www.aisc.org. They
published a couple of books, Manual of Steel Construction, &, Detailing for
Steel Construction, but I have heard that these are now a single volume. The
Manual of Steel Construction covers physical properties of US standard
rolled shapes, nominal dimensions & joint design, etc. The Detailing for
Steel Construction covers the "drafting" dimensions of US standard rolled
shapes, stuff like hole gages, etc.

 

Well, a few things are being discussed and hear are my couple coper pennys

if your dimensions are directly associated to your details at a one to one
Scale i belive it is possible to change the dimension properties through
Autocad's Dimension Settings.

The paper Sizes are relative to the plot style's. You can choose extense to
maximize the paper Area being used
you may need to set a PC2 of Pc3 file with the appropiate pen settings. not
a problem!

and last but not least I have seen the X steel Demos and it appears to be an
extensive program with all the fixing to produce any kind of structural or
misc. steel details.
although I must say SD/S2 or something like that is being used more than
X-steel for structural detailing. I am working on putting some time into
these two programs, but it will take some investment, too much money for my
shallow pockets.

hopefully at the end of this month my boss will make a choice on which
program to use after attending a seminar.

There you go My UK friend
Viva El Salvador

 

Although strucad and xsteel are excellent steel detailing programmes,
both require a significant investment. A single customer request for the
contract in one of the software programmes, would not be a justified
investment in either. Having used both , I understand the immense benefits
for the customer in getting his drawings on one of them. Detailing steelwork
on autocad in preference to strucad/xsteel is like using an abbacus as
opposed
to a laptop. If a strucad detailer were given all of the contract info at
the startup,
he could finish the contract extremely quickly. Alternatively draw the
initial plan layout,
and supply a strucad detailer with the autocad plan, he can dxf it into
strucad and
get detailing fast.

Tim

 

Thanks for the reference Mark

Jim

 

Thanks guys for all the input, it's much appreciated. I like
the idea of sub-contracting the detailing out to a
StruCAD/XSteel man, it would give me more time to bring the
AutoCAD drawings up to standard as the originals leave a bit to
be desired

Regards,

Jim
Abacad Design

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