Structural Steelwork

Buildings are becoming technically more complex. At the same time, the building industry is facing ever-increasing client-lead pressure for
a reduction in the total project time and cost, and improved quality.

These circumstances have fuelled the investigation of innovative approaches and techniques in design and construction within the industry, aimed at improving the quality and cost of building project.

Over the last decades many research projects aimed at improving the performance of the industry were dedicated to improving performance on site, both in terms of management and construction techniques.

For example, the procurement and fabrication phases of structural steel frame has been halved over recent years and this has been achieved by a better organized and automated fabrication.

Despite the effort, construction productivity has not however improved to the same extent (Atkin et al. 1994; Constructional Steelworks, 1987).

Studies conducted in the manufacturing industry, of which construction is increasingly considered to be a part, reveal that 80% of the costs are committed during the first 20% of the project live cycle and up until now the technology is been primarily aim at saving time and cost out of another 80% of the project but this can be expected to yield saving base on the minor part of the total cost base (Boothroyd 1994).

In the light of intense market pressure, manufacturing organizations have become increasingly aware of the importance of product design evolving from a valid basis right from the very beginning of a project.

Consequently in order to gain the greatest competitiveness, manufacturing organizations, particularly the car and aircraft industries, have been targeting conceptual design leading to the establishment of streamlined processes which give improved quality, lower cost and faster time to market.

The industry has been using been 3D prototypes as an integral part of the problem-solving process which can test the feasibility of legislation and manufacturing issues in real time so that high quality products can be generated at the end of the process.

The latest evolutionary development in manufacturing industry is the application of knowledge based engineering (KBE) systems technology. Advanced manufacturing industry has been able to create generic electronic prototypes of products at an early stage in the design process by using KBE.

This has allowed refinement of the product by incorporating automatic testing of all relevant rules and ensured that considerations of standardisation of components, manufacturability, assembly and other process requirements are built into the model.

The technology has provided manufacturing organisations with the means to develop effective prototypes that yield advantages in product development time, improved quality of problem solving, increased productivity of engineers, better use of capital resources, and a smoother process by which products move into commercial production (Martin 1994).

The potential benefit of the KBE systems technology to the construction industry has been demonstrated by the recent research work by BAA Plc., the University of Reading and others on the application of KBE electronic prototype technology to the design of airport terminals (Barlow et al 1995).

The ability of the system to develop generic non project-specific models of airport terminal elements using BAA's harnessed knowledge of planning, designing, building and operating airport allows them to generate a number of alternative design solutions for evaluation.

The key strength of the system is the ability of its software to rapidly generate new designs and the 3D modelling capability that allows visualisation of designs, how they will function and how they will be maintained from an early stage of the design process.

Some construction industry experts believe that KBE is the technology that could have a massive effect by presenting real choices for clients, and promoting better construction performance (Latham 1994).

This paper is extending the novel KBE technology to the detailed design of building by developing structural design systems to augment the structural designer's creativity and expertise in designing steel buildings at the early stage of the design.

The greater proportion of prefabricated components used in steel frames can strongly benefit from the system where they must be customised or reconfigured to meet the different requirements of a variety of different spatial plans for buildings.

Structural engineers can generate more alternative structural configurations that could provide the intended structural function and in conjunction with the design team could evaluate them more thoroughly.

This will produce unique, high quality buildings from project-independent standard products, and through the careful design of structural connections, fabrication and erection.

The costs for structural steel frames will be predicted early in a project with greater certainty, and it is believed that the degree of confidence generated will contribute to the goal of an overall reduction in project cost.