
	Applies To

	Product(s):	STAAD Foundation Advanced
	Version(s):	ALL
	Environment:	ALL
	Area:	General Foundation
	Subarea:	Mat Foundation
	Original Author:	Sye Chakraborty, Bentley Technical Support Group

I have modeled a mat using plates in STAAD.Pro. How can I get the mat transferred to STAAD.foundation Advanced (SFA) and design it ?

The steps are listed next

1 Open your STAAD.pro model and run the analysis. Once the analysis is complete, close STAAD.pro completely.
2.Launch STAAD Foundation Advanced (SFA).
3.Click the “Import STAAD.pro” button, shown below. Depending on which version of SFA you are using you have to choose one

Newer version Older version

4.Locate your STAAD.pro file, select it, and click “Open”.
5.You will see the following dialog box appear. Make sure the “Import Plates” option is selected and then specify the desired code/units:

6.Click “Import”. You will see your mat appear on screen.
7.You must define a boundary in order for the design to work. Change the view so you are looking at the mat from a top perspective and click on the “Add Rectangular Boundary” button under the Tools menu at the top of the screen:

If your mat boundary is irregular, you may use the Add Polygonal Boundary option.

8.Click on the upper left hand corner of your mat and then drag down to the lower right hand corner, then release. You will see the boundary outline appear, as shown next: Actually it does not matter if the boundary does not exactly match your mat as you are not going to generate any meshing in SFA. You just need a boundary to exist for SFA to carry out the design.

9.Go to Mat Foundation Job -> Mesh Generation -> Meshing Setup on the left hand side of the screen:

10.You will see the “Meshing Setup” dialog box appear to the right. Click on the boundary to select it (it will turn red), then give the region a name and click “Add”:

11.Now you are ready to proceed with the design. You can commence with the moment envelope generation as you normally would for a mat foundation job type.

A few points to note here are, the analysis of the mat is carried out in STAAD.Pro and the results of the analysis are directly imported in STAAD Foundation Advanced. That is why no further meshing or analysis are needed in STAAD Foundation Advanced. Also a mat foundation job is created automatically with a slab import and hence that step of creating a mat job is NOT required to be carried out inside STAAD Foundation Advanced. It is also worth mentioning that punching shear checks are not carried out as of now for mats imported directly from STAAD.Pro.

A video demonstrating the above workflow is available at

https://communities.bentley.com/products/ram-staad/m/structural_analysis_and_design_gallery/275051

Mat analyzed in STAAD.Pro and designed in STAAD.Foundation Advanced

See Also