Intended users
Structural Designer; Architecture Engineering.
Need you’re trying to provide a solution or support for
When structural designers design and analyze the load-bearing capacity and structural elements of a building, they must calculate the building's dead load, live load, snow load, wind load and seismic load. These calculations are rigorous and detailed, so the amount of calculation work is huge and prone to errors when the building is complex and irregular. Whether it is a building that has already been generated in Revit or a new building generated with Dynamo, designers can quickly get the results they need to calculate. Based on the results, designers can preliminarily determine the elements' sizes (beam and column) and apply them to structural analysis software (such as SAP2000, ETABS). At the same time, structural engineers can use numerical values to perform load combinations and see if they comply with building codes, and finally determine the elements' sizes. In addition, Dynamo's automated operation is also one of the ways to review and verify manual calculation results.
Inputs
Constants:
materials unit weight; wind speed; seismic response coefficient;
Variables:
Building Height; Base Radius; Middle Radius; Top Radius; Rotation; …Building Dimensions
Underlying logic of the model you’ll implement
-Create the building structure model in Dynamo;
-Define input for material properties and dimensions of all structural elements;
-Define dead loads:
Identify all the structural and non-structural elements that contribute to the dead load (e.g., beams, columns, slabs, walls, fixed equipment).Find the unit weights of the materials (e.g., concrete, steel, glass) from standard tables or material specifications.
Add all W together, W=V×γ, (V is the volume and γ is the unit weight.)
-Define live loads:
Figure out live loads as per code requirements for different areas according to building codes like ASCE 7.
-Define wind loads:
Using wind pressure calculations and applying them to the appropriate surfaces.
Figure out the basic wind speed for the specific location.
Calculate Wind Pressure q=0.00256×V^2 (q is the wind pressure in psf and V is the wind speed in mph). Factors: exposure, building height, and shape.
-Define seismic loads:
V=C_s×W (V is the base shear, C_s is the seismic response coefficient, and W is dead load).
Distribute the base shear force along the height of the building.
-Calculate Load Combinations:
Combine the dead loads, live loads, wind loads and seismic loads by using code-specified load combinations for design.
-Calculate Total Material Cost
sum all types Unit material price * area/volume.
-Calculate Total Construction Cost
unit construction price * height of building
Outputs
Dead Load
Live Load
Wind Load
Seismic Load
Combination Load
Calculate Total Material Cost
Calculate Total Construction Cost