What is a project that cannot be applied on site? It stays a project, an  idea or a design. It cannot become structure. That is why constructible design, is very critical for us.

What does a project that cannot be applied on site do? It stays as a project, an idea or a design. It cannot become a construction. That is why a project, which is applicable on site, is very critical to us. Parametric design is in great demand lately and “Constructability” is a parameter of a good structural design too. Constructability is one of the favorite parameters of ATTEC.

Constructability can be defined as adapting the design to the site in a best way or to be sure, that design can be easily applied on site. Here, information flow is the key. It starts on the drawing table and ends up on site. Alternatively, using the previous experience from the previous projects when designing new structural projects is another option.

Site engineering is necessary for us. Periodical site controls make us sure, that our structural design can be easily applicable on our sophisticated steel, concrete, timber and masonry construction projects. Therefore, we can check and update our designs as required before it causes a construction crisis or ineffectiveness. Thanks to our site engineering branch where we use the previous site experience when we design projects in the office and we make projects with minimum design faults.

I wanted to share with you one of our site applications as an example.

As all civil engineers know that significant forces affect construction while earthquake duration. Construction joints are designed by considering most unfavorable force. Otherwise, we built a construction that cannot resist to earthquake forces and of course that is the last thing we want as civil engineers.

At one of our ongoing timber construction projects, we have wanted to design an effective connection that resist to both tension and compression forces between ridge beam and bearing plate. The calculations have showed that the timber elements could easily transfer compression loads from ridge beam to bearing plate. On the other hand, timber elements could not resist to the tension forces, which occurs during an earthquake due to the lack of bolt members for connection. The connections should provide enough bolts varying between two to five region by region. In addition, of course we had to perform a good practical design that gives us enough area for bolts installation. A brilliant idea emerged that if we fill the gap between the ridge beam and floor joist and tie all timber members from ridge beam to floor joist with enough bolts that could be resistant to the designed tension forces.

After filling the gap area between ridge beam and floor joist with timber member, we could design the connections by caring only the distances between each of the bolts that are installed to timber members. Moreover, this provides us with enough room to act freely. So we finalized the connection which could resist both tension and compression forces. I wanted to share with you my scribble and our connection sketch for site as well as the photos from the site.