...and some equipment supports and ceiling grids.

That's INSANE!

Steven wrote:
That's INSANE!

Who? Me? What else should I use?

It sure was a lot easier than it would have been in Revit. Tekla can do more of course, but it's more that I don't need (I'm not doing shops and my connection details are simple), and Tekla is quite pricey compared to ArchiCAD.

BTW: Notice that I didn't put the corrugated steel in the deck. That really does slow things down. (Does look cool though.)

Complex profile is a GREAT tool of AC.
its more like an extrude to path tool, with an editable shape. You can do great things.

Dwight wrote:
Following a spline

How did you do the 3d spline?

Matthew wrote:

Steven wrote:
That's INSANE!

Who? Me? What else should I use?

It sure was a lot easier than it would have been in Revit. Tekla can do more of course, but it's more that I don't need (I'm not doing shops and my connection details are simple), and Tekla is quite pricey compared to ArchiCAD.

BTW: Notice that I didn't put the corrugated steel in the deck. That really does slow things down. (Does look cool though.)

Insane in a good way!

Matthew wrote:
Here's a little steel frame I built almost entirely with CPs.

Hey Matthew,

It's interesting you should bring this up, as I actually recommended using the steel library parts instead of CPs in this thread the other day. It would be useful if you could explain why you chose to use complex profiles in combination with beams and columns for that. I've always found using the library parts simpler.

From my own experimentation and limited project use, neither of them are perfect for the job of representing steelwork. You can't adjust the length of library parts with the marquee, but you do get all the steelwork sizes built in, and they have lots of data included to schedule. The beam tool has no control of the cover fill and is a pain to join different sizes correctly, but does stretch with the marquee. Neither of them have the ability to add the correct connection details to the ends which would be really useful.

It would be amazing if you could actually dynamically link the end of a beam to a column, so if the column was resized, the beam would re-adjust correctly thus saving a lot of fiddly manual adjustment. I imagine a steelwork system tool similar to the curtain wall tool would be great for something like this.

Erika wrote:
Not that this might be a better or worse scenario, but you could apply steel profiles to the parts of a CW system.

To be honest, I think this would be even more awkward and fiddly to set up than just using the standard tools. It needs to be much more specialised than this to be useful.

I wonder if anyone has made a wish for a steelwork system tool? I would be happy to flesh out what I think is required in a separate thread.