Nicolas Gomez's Activities

Entering Atypical composite decks

Nicolas Gomez — Mon, 21 Oct 2019 16:14:14 GMT

Hello,

I am in the process of modeling a new building and given the long spans required, we are using an atypical composite deck catalog, using 6.125" of Lightweight 6" flutes. However i am at loss as how to enter these deck properties, since all the standard choices in RAM are in the 1.5" to 3" range. Is there a way to input custom deck properties as one of the deck choices? I've found the RAMDECKS.DCK file with the standard Vulcraft and other deck composite systems (C:/ProgramData/Bentley/Engineering/RAM Structural System/Tables). However opening the file shows a table where I'm able to infer what some values (flute depth, and spacing) are but not others. Is there a guide that can tell me what the other values are, or if there is a less hacky way to input atypical deck configurations?

Thank-you in advance.

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Wed, 30 Jan 2019 01:05:04 GMT

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Composite Action with two different slab thicknesses.

Nicolas Gomez — Wed, 30 Jan 2019 21:55:23 GMT

Hello, I am trying to model a beam with two composite decks, each in a different orientation (picture 1).

The ‘left’ is a 3” deck with 3.5” of topping, the “right” is a 1.5” deck with 2.5” of topping (spanning perpendicular to the beam). The ‘right’ deck is sitting on top of some bar joists so it is raised to be flush with the thicker deck on the ‘left’ (spanning parallel to the beam, across the aforementioned bar joists).

If I make the two decks composite with the accurate thicknesses, how does RAM decide to calculate the composite action of the beam? Does it take the thinnest deck and assume that overall?

Does it consider each deck, and assume the topping isn’t flush (picture 2)?

Thank-you for your time,

Niko

RAM Structural System Version 15.05