The selection of building material and framing system depends on load bearing capacity, functionality, economy and desired lifespan. The framing system must have sufficient bending characteristics to accommodate architecture style of the building and non-structural elements. Frames are basic skeleton of the building made with wood, steel, reinforced concrete or prefabricated materials.
Light weight wood frames are most popular for the construction of 2 to 3, single or multiple residential apartments. Structurally it is a repetitive bond of wood joists on wood studs. All wood buildings are engineered in compliance with the International One and Two Residential Building Code. Commercial and industrial wood buildings commonly have larger floor spans with few retaining walls.
Steel buildings are made up of repetitive framing of steel beams and columns. The beam-column connections are completely developed as a moment connection to withstand lateral loads. Lateral forces are transmitted by steel decking to the moment resisting frames. These frames can be placed almost anywhere in the structure. Steel buildings are typically more flexible than wood buildings in their design and offers benefits of fire resistance, offsite fabrication of components and low cost.
Steel buildings made up of light frame are usually pre-engineered and fabricated with solid frames in the transverse orthogonal design. These frames offer maximum strength when columns and beams are built up of light steel plates.
Precast Concrete Frame buildings contains floor and roof decking made up of precast concrete members for better earthquake resistance. Precast concrete columns and girders support the decking system along with reinforced steel to interconnect these elements.
Higher strength and deformation capacity of these connections help resist lateral loads as desired in major seismic upheavals.
The building structural engineer must ensure their designs meet desired load, safety, architectural, serviceability and performance criteria. It should easily withstand massive live and dead loads along with climate changes and natural disasters.
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Richard Bothom is Construction Structural design engineer at OSD – a Structural Engineering consultant offering full range of structural services including Structural design analysis, Shop drawings and review services at affordable rates. Contact us http://www.outsourcestructuraldesign.com
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