In this new version, aluminium sections requiring longitudinal welds can now be introduced in the Special aluminium sections editor. The program checks these sections taking into account the reduction of the resistance properties which arise in areas close to these welds: where the elastic limit of the material is affected significantly. The softened zone is referred to as the HAZ (heat affected zone), its extent and severity are calculated by the program.
In previous versions of the program, the automatic calculation of the susceptibility to local buckling due to compression was already included assuming that each of the flat elements making up the section buckled in an isolated manner (independent from the rest), and the possibility was included, for any other type of buckling other than the individual type to be considered, to modify the local buckling coefficient which affects the slenderness parameter associated to each element. In this new version, the automatic calculation of the susceptibility to local buckling due to compression considering the possibility that several elements can buckle together as if they were a single element, is also included, hence combined buckling modes are obtained. The program is able to detect and analyse the buckling in a group of elements in the following cases:
The combined buckling is also studied if the elements making up the section have been stiffened, which is commonly referred to as buckling due to distortion. Regarding the stiffened elements, a new assistant has been implemented for the design with standard reinforcement in accordance with that exposed in EC9.
The following rolled steel codes have been implemented for the five joints modules (Joints I, Joints II, Joints III, Joints IV and Joints V):
NCh433.Of1996 Modified in 2009 (Chile). Official Chilean Code. Seismic Design of Buildings.
Implemented in CYPECAD and Metal 3D. Includes the emergency modifications presented in the Decree Nº117 (V. and U.) of the Diario Official de Chile of the 14th February 2011.
NSR-10 (Colombia): Reglamento Colombiano de Construcción Sismo Resistente
Code implemented in CYPECAD and Metal 3D.
The NSR-10 code substitute the outdated NSR-98 code. Nonetheless, any of the two codes can be used in CYPECAD and Metal 3D.
CFE 2008 (Mexico): Manual de diseño de Obras Civiles. Diseño por sismo. Comisión Federal de Electricidad. México 2008.
Code implemented in CYPECAD and Metal 3D.
DIN 18800:2008-11 (Alemania): Deutsches Institut für Normung. Stahlbauten.
Code implemented in CYPECAD and Metal 3D for the following sections:
Rolled and welded steel
Cold-formed steel
The following elements have been implemented when exporting to Tekla structures:
An optimisation in the analysis procedure now reduces the time taken to analyse structures with applied earthquake loads.
Metal 3D has incorporated the possibility to define Ties between nodes. The ties between the nodes are used to indicate that two or more nodes have the same displacements for all the loadcases. This displacement can be in one, two or three directions in accordance with the X, Y and Z global axes. The number corresponding to each group of nodes whose displacements have been tied is displayed on screen.
Bear in mind that for two or more nodes to have the same displacement, an element or construction arrangement must be present in the structure that will effectively materialise the equal displacement hypothesis.
Ties cannot be assigned to nodes that form part of braced frames when the tied displacement has its projection on the plane of the braced frame.
The C1 coefficient for the lateral buckling critical moment can now be defined. Generally speaking, each code offers specific values for these coefficients associated with different bending moment distributions.
