Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Seth Guthrie — Thu, 27 Apr 2023 14:54:28 GMT

Critical work to separate out the live loads has begun. It's still too far off to estimate completion, but it is a priority for us. Meanwhile the prior suggestions here are the best bet.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

E.O.A — Thu, 27 Apr 2023 14:39:27 GMT

Hi Seth Guthrie I am wondering if there has been any updates regarding this. Is there a way or a work around to consider wind uplift, snow and live load occurring simultaneously in RAM SS models?

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Jason McCool — Mon, 06 May 2019 19:35:30 GMT

I think we all understand limited resources and the need to prioritize; it's just Bentley's choices in priorities that leave a lot of us scratching our heads. Prioritizing basic load conditions that show up on almost every single project over making the previously simple licensing almost unbearable probably would've been a good development path to try these last couple of years... I know we were ready to walk away from Bentley forever after y'all revamped your licensing so that we could unknowingly exceed our license count and then get charged an overage for it when that had been impossible before. And I know we were far from the only ones looking at other design options through that whole "Trust" licensing ordeal.

Focus on excelling on the basics before moving on to other areas of development. I can run 1000 load cases in Frame with seismic, wind, and gravity loads, and get the governing case for each member, but I can't run 2 competing cases at the same time and get worst case result from between them if they're roof live and snow? And I can generate all my lateral wind pressures in a second, but not get the positive and negative wind pressures on the roof factored in that will be acting at the same time as those wall pressures? Still seems like a pretty significant lack of functionality to go uncorrected for the 9 years I've been using RAM, much less the 23 years Mr. Reinke has. I've had the opportunity now to use some competing programs, and there's a lot of things that are automated in RAM that aren't in other programs, so I appreciate what y'all have done - believe me, I do! - but it's really time to focus on some of these longstanding issues instead of continuing to kick the can down the road.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Allen Adams — Wed, 24 Apr 2019 14:10:44 GMT

It isn’t because we don’t appreciate how important it is, nor because we lack the desire. Rather, it is a matter of best using the limited resources that we have to produce a program that best increases the productivity of all of our clients. As we contemplate what features to add we are constantly weighing the value of the feature versus the “cost”: Who in our development group is available? Who is capable of that particular feature? How long will it take, and what won’t get done if we do that? For some shortcomings there are things that can be done to work around the limitations, but for others there isn’t a reasonable workaround; we have to consider that, too, when we prioritize our efforts. We always appreciate constructive feedback, it helps us prioritize our efforts. Let us know what you want, why you want it, and how it will help you be more productive.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Gregory B. Reinke — Thu, 04 Apr 2019 18:26:35 GMT

I started using RAMSteel in 1996. I remember around that time we were promised that wind uplift was getting added on the next release. 23 years later, and still waiting.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Jason McCool — Tue, 05 Dec 2017 13:07:08 GMT

Well, at least roof live load, snow load, and wind uplift are rare loading conditions that hardly ever occur on the vast majority of jobs... oh wait, never mind... But I suppose it is easier to market cool new advanced features than to say you've finally fixed basic functions after an awkwardly long time.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Allen Adams — Mon, 04 Dec 2017 21:39:19 GMT

Unfortunately this annoying limitation is still in the same situation as it was 7 years ago. With limits on resources we have had to focus on more critical items such as Code updates and more advanced analysis, design, and reporting capabilities such as Diaphragm cross section forces and Construction sequence analysis, to name just two. We recognize that we need to modify the program to provide for both Roof and Snow loads, as well as Wind uplift. A surprising amount of work due to the complexity of the surface load distribution and load tracking algorithms. We actually started work on them, but had to divert the resources to something more critical. So while we recognize the need, I can't even guess when we will be able to implement those changes.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Nulukkizdin — Mon, 04 Dec 2017 18:45:43 GMT

Any more updates on timeline for this? We also run into cases where we have live loads and snow loads applied to a balcony. This isn't a big deal in low snow areas, but leads to some headaches when you're consistently seeing high snow loads.

Is there even actually a plan to fix this? OP posted stating the original timeline was 2010 and now 7 years later we haven't seen the fix...

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Seth Guthrie — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 22:00:43 GMT

Indeed, in all the LRFD based codes we include all the live loads including roof and snow at the higher factor. Most beams only support one type or the other, but for those that support both it can be conservative. This is an existing enhancement request in our system: Enhancement 120493: Load Combinations and Enhancement 178253: Allow Snow and Roof Live loads (and combinations)

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Andrew Seeton — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 21:53:10 GMT

A related comment: RAM SS Beam module does not handle Canadian (NBCC) load combinations properly where live loading and snow loading are combined. The NBCC combination would be 1.25D+1.5L+0.5S or 1.25D+1.5S+0.5L, whichever governs. RAM SS incorrectly calculates the combination as 1.25D+1.5L+1.5S.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Jason McCool — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 22:02:11 GMT

Ah, yes, I can see that being an issue. At that previous company, we set up the program from the beginning with a very open structure for load factor variables and combinations, so that we could easily add new load combinations with different factors for revised building codes, and save custom combinations for oddball cases or testing. I've done some peer review since then for colleagues at another company that had load factors hard-coded, and the switch from ASCE7-05 wind to ASCE 7-10 was particularly frustrating as they had to scale their input loads to get IBC 2012 results with IBC 2006 factors until they got their software updated. Good luck.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Seth Guthrie — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 20:16:09 GMT

Thanks for the comments guys. I agree it can be one of those unwelcome surprises when you have the wrong setting, and it can be overly conservative in other cases. The hard part is that Ram Steel needs to be enhanced to handle multiple combinations where it currently only deals with hard coded combinations (e.g. 1.4 Dead or 1.2 Dead and 1.6 (all) Live) and that is a bigger task to overhaul than it seems. I did flag the official enhancement request to reference this post FWIW.

RE: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Jason McCool — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 18:29:07 GMT

Can I just throw in my vote for that being a good priority? Especially after this long? I know I was really surprised 5 years ago when I first started using RAM to find that it couldn't handle as complex of load cases as the in-house joist design software at my previous company. It allowed snow, roof live, uplift, and just about anything else we could dream up to be run concurrently and the governing combination picked for a design summary similar to when you click View Results on a beam in RAM SS. This has always seemed like a surprisingly basic limitation on what's otherwise a workhorse of a program that does all of our floor designs well, but leaves a bad aftertaste on every roof design that we have to run twice to check roof live OR base snow with drifts.

Re: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Seth Guthrie — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 20:30:19 GMT

Nothing definitive. Right now the company is trying to prioritize all the features and applications for the next round of development.

Re: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

sbouvia — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 17:11:43 GMT

Any time line as to when it will not exist?

Re: Roof Live Loads vs. Snow Loads RAM SS

Seth Guthrie — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 04:37:15 GMT

Wow, that estimate was not very good. The limitation still exists, I'm afraid.