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Just wondering if anyone can share some insights on the placement of the steel beams and any consequent impact on pricing / ease of construction?
As illustrated by the sample below, assume steel beams are required to support the first floor, they may be along aside the ground floor external wall as highlighted in orange, or not along side any ground floor wall as highlighted in yellow.
Obviously the placements will be driven by design/setback requirements, but from a ease of construction / cost perspective, do the different locations of the steel beams make any difference? Or not?
Many thanks.
You'll require beams over the meals, Theatre, Family, guest and garage
If you are looking at optimising the engineering whereby reducing costs.
It's a bit too late now after you have signed up,
Whatever you take out now the builder keeps the profit and credits the min. cost, what gets added in goes in at a higher rate and profit..
That should have been explained to you by the sales man before you signed up.
It's just a question based on a sample online that is relevant to my situation.
So if you wouldn't mind shedding some light on this so I can still tweak my design that would be appreciated.
That's the problem with copied online plans and 3D artistic renderings, also you may have infringe copyright
What you have highlighted in red is partly incorrect there are no beams over the external support walls.
there are lintels over windows and openings.
You are better off handing over your own design to a pro to tidy up the design, engineering , 3D model data with quants.
As tidying up the design errors, misunderstandings, etc later in the process comes at considerable costs
I guess you missed the part where I said "assume steel beams are required".
It would have to be a simple answer to the question: whether a steel beam over a wall, or a steel beam that is not over a wall, results in any cost and construction differences? No?
TLDR; Longer spans = larger steel section sizes = larger footings = more cost in steel and concrete and installation time/equipment.
Steel beams aren't required over walls, they are required to span across openings where the loading is more than a timber member can span.
Wherever a steel beam is required it will cost more than timber due to larger installation equipment needed and larger support posts, and foundations.
IMHO and experience I would suggest the following for the example shown with my mark ups colour coded as below:
Blue = 90 x 90 double stud post or steel to support steel beam over or similar
Red = Garage lintel needs to be beefed up to support end of beam over garage likely to a PFC steel section
Pink = May require additional steel post
Green = Steel beam locations to span across openings below - varies from your highlight
Thank you for the comprehensive response. Understand steel beams incur additional costs and there may be ways to reduce the usage as you have demonstrated. But if they are required to support the first floor, it seems there is no real cost or construction impact whether they are over a wall or not from your explanation?
Depends on your cladding, you would certainly need stronger beams to support bricks.
On the drawing above you would also need a beam running throughout meals and family room perpendicular to orange wall and green beam.
I also doubt that you will be able to find floor joists which will be able to cover complete distance between orange wall and green beam (it seems to be over 8 meters), so you are likely to end up with another beam running through the middle of the house.
I don't think you would need to run them over the wall either, e.g. on your orange wall you would only need a beam to cover the home theatre.
Thank you for the comprehensive response. Understand steel beams incur additional costs and there may be ways to reduce the usage as you have demonstrated. But if they are required to support the first floor, it seems there is no real cost or construction impact whether they are over a wall or not from your explanation?
Short answer, it depends.
Long answer is more like alexp79 above. The final design will dictate where beams are required or not based on floor joist spans from the floor above.
If your first floor plan covers areas where there are no walls below, and the span dictates it, you will require steel beams.
Steel beams over walls = not required.
Steel beams are for spans where timber doesn't make it.
Where they are positioned is not the subject of any material cost differential. Their requirement or not is the material cost differential.
p.s. I missed the opening to the rear where you will require another steel beam and posts, in my mark up.
This span is likely to be the greatest and require most steel.
Depends on your cladding, you would certainly need stronger beams to support bricks.
On the drawing above you would also need a beam running throughout meals and family room perpendicular to orange wall and green beam.
I also doubt that you will be able to find floor joists which will be able to cover complete distance between orange wall and green beam (it seems to be over 8 meters), so you are likely to end up with another beam running through the middle of the house.
I don't think you would need to run them over the wall either, e.g. on your orange wall you would only need a beam to cover the home theatre.
Thank you. Yes, might ditch the bricks for hebel for the first floor for the final design, if it brings cost savings.
Designers and clients look at plans from the top down.
Most of the structural support elements are missing.
Try looking at it the way engineers look at it
That is from the bottom up as loads are transferred from the roof -> wall-> steel Beams-> steel columns-> footings-> Ground
or you'll get confused trying to rationalize load paths on an architectural drawing
which focuses on the walls above rather than the supporting wall/columns below.
Hebel still may require steel beams
As I've suggest get proper engineering drawings done
HTH
I notice with my build that the framing company dictated the beams required. Now the person who plugs in the numbers is not an engineer as they rely on the software to design the whole frame. What I have noticed and I'm not happy about it, is they specified a UB above a door opening, but on the other side a girder truss. The truss would have been cheaper an easier to erect. That amongst many other things puzzle me. When quizzed they said it was too late to change the design.
It doesn't mater what software the framing company is using, structural elements still need to be certified by an engineer.
Not sure why they are using a UB over a door opening as you haven't provided any plans or details. ( be careful not to infringe copyright)
Unfortunately it's too late now as the builder would have no interest in optimising span/cost. I would also say the engineer is happy to go with an oversized member.. ie. more fees, charges and costs all round
Why would an engineer need to specify. The NCC has steel sections.
You can use the limited info in the NCC steel supports for floor and roof loads.. What about Balconies with higher loads,
structural masonry and hebel wall loads which relates to the initial post, where are they in the NCC?
I see a reference to AS1720, AS4100, etc
You've got the problem where the builder says I want an alternate method that's more costly, is he going to put in a cheap truss..?
Check to see if your Building Surveyor and Council Building dept. will accept it and what their processes are?
BTW, Here's the NCC where is the external Cladding? (1st post)
another example of Pay a deposit and lol, we'll sort the cladding out later on...
Along with the upgrade steel beams, steel columns, footings etc.