AISC Steel Beam Designer Tool

This steel beam analysis tool uses the finite element analysis (FEA) method to analyze and design wide flange beams (aka I beams or W shapes) in strong axis bending with any support conditions under any loading. The program can analyze any standard AISC shape. See AISC Structural Steel Dimensioning Tool for a list of all available W shapes. The program can handle a mix of both SI and imperial units for all input parameters. The output report is always generated in imperial units regardless of the input units.

The program generates an analysis report using LaTeX. See the Example Output Reports directory for examples of the reporting format and features. The output report shows a sketch of the beam loading, along with a table of input loads. The output report also includes a bending and shear check, along with all applicable calculations in human-readable format. Finally, the program reports the deflection check and reactions at each support. Strength checks are run with ASCE 7-16 LRFD load combinations and deflection calculations are run with ASCE 7-16 ASD load combinations. For a list of load combinations and other beam properties used in design, please refer to steel_beam_analysis/db.

The following instructions list all of the requirements to run the program. This assumes that the user has a basic understanding of how to run a python script. Click here to see the python website, where you can download the latest version of python.

Development

From the root directory of this Github repo.

Create virtual environment

With python installed, enter the following command into the terminal.

python3 -m venv venv

Activate virtual environment

source venv/bin/activate

Install requirements in virtual environment

pip install --upgrade pip
pip install -r requirements.txt
python setup.py install

Additionally, in order to render the output analysis report using LaTeX, you will need a LaTeX distribution that cannot be installed as a python package. For macOS users, you can install MacTeX. Alternatively, for Windows, you should download TeX Live Full.

Analyze an example beam

Running the following scripts will analyze a few example beams. Also see documentation below for how to create your own beam.

cd test
python test1.py
python test2.py
python test3.py
python test4.py
python test5.py

Creating a beam for analysis

In addition to the examples provided as test cases, please see the following instructions for how to create your own beam for analysis.

Recognized load types

The program recognizes the following load types: D, E, F, H, L, Lr, R, S, W. The naming convention for load types corresponds to ASCE 7-16 variable definitions. Please refer to ASCE 7-16 for any additional descriptions of load types.

Recognized units

The program recognizes all units in both SI and imperial systems and works with both systems interchangeably. See the following examples for how units are assigned to input parameters.

Create Node Objects

Each beam must have nodes. Each node can be represent a pin support, fixed support, free end, or location of a load. See the next section for documentation on how to apply loads to nodes.

Example of a free node located at 3 ft, with a couple of point loads

node0 = Node(3*units.ft, pointLoads = [p0, p1], desc = 'my description')

Note, this node is only added for the application of loads. It is not considered as a support. Loads are supplied to the node as a list. A description of the load is optional, but can be helpful for documentation in the output report.

Example of a pinned node at 0 ft with no applied loading

node1 = Node (0*units.ft, condition = 'pin')

Create a Point Load Object

Point load objects can be applied to beams. A couple of example point loads are as follows:

Applied shear to beam

p = PointLoad(shear = 1.6 * units.kip, type = 'D')

Applied moment to beam

p = PointLoad(moment = 3 * units.kft, type = 'D')

Create an area load object

distLoad1 = AreaLoad(iLoc = 0 * units.ft, jLoc = 19 * units.ft, load = 23 * units.psf, iTrib = 0.67 * units.ft, jTrib = 0.67 * units.ft, type = 'D', desc = 'typ floor')

The area load object starts at a particular point, ends at another point, and has an associated tributary area. The tributary area can vary along the length of the load in order to create a trapezoidal loading condition.

Create a line load object

lineLoad1 = LineLoad(iLoc = 0 * units.ft, jLoc = 13 * units.ft, iLineLoad = 0.026 * units.klf, jLineLoad = 0.02 * units.klf, type = 'D', desc = 'floor')

The line load object is similar to the area load object, except the line load's units are in force per foot, and there is no tributary area associated with the line load.

Create a beam object

Once nodes, point loads, area loads, and/or line loads have been defined, it's time to create the beam object.

nodes is defined as a list of all of the nodes on the beam
rawDistLoads is defined as a list of all line loads and area loads on the beam
considerSelfWeight can be set to True or False. This sets whether self weight is considered as an applied load.
depthClass is the nominal depth of the beam (i.e. for a W10x100, this would be 10)
weightClass is the weight per foot of the beam (i.e. for a W10x100, this would be 100)
eleSpacing is the spacing of elements in the finite element mesh. A finer mesh produces smoother moment, shear and deflection envelopes, but does not impact the overall DCRs. Using a finer mesh increases the solution time. A mesh size between 1 inch and 12 inches is appropiate for most problems.
name is the name of the beam used in the analysis report
outputPath is the file path where the program saves the output report

An example for creating the beam is as follows:

beam = SteelBeam(nodes, rawDistLoads = lineLoads, considerSelfWeight = True,
depthClass = 10, weightClass = 12, eleSpacing = 2 * units.inch, outputPDF = True, name = 'Test3', outputPath = 'output_reports/test3')

To print out the demand capacity ratio (DCR aka stress ratio) for both bending and shear to the terminal, add the following line at the end:

print(beam)

License

Copyright (c) 2022 Jesse Bluestein

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.