TheStructuralEngineer

May 2019
Volume 97 | Issue 5

The flagship publication of The Institution of Structural Engineers

TOP
DRAWER
Our competition winners
highlight the value of sketching
as a communication tool

DESIGNING FOR CHANGE

PERFORMANCE-BASED
STANDARDS

DESIGNING A BASE PLATE

TSE 87_COVER .indd 1 02/05/2019 11:21

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 Upfront
thestructuralengineer.org Contents

PAGE 10 DESIGNING FOR CHANGE PAGE 26 DESIGNING A BASE PLATE PAGE 30 PERFORMANCE-BASED STANDARDS?

TheStructuralEngineer
Volume 97 | Issue 5

Upfront Professional guidance Opinion

5 Editorial 18 Business Practice Note No. 24: How to prepare a 30 Viewpoint: Which way now for codes and standards:
6 Institution news: robust specification and reduce risks – especially Prescription, performance-based or what?
Institution election/transfer/reinstatement list: when re-using a previous specification 33 Verulam
18 March 2019
7 Institution news: 22 Confidential Reporting on Structural Safety 36 Book review: Engineering Hitler’s downfall: the brains
How do we achieve global interoperability in a (CROSS): newsletter 54 that enabled victory
complex world? 24 Introducing the online Chartered Membership 38 Book review: Matrix methods of structural analysis
Website update: Five changes you can expect Examination preparation course
8 Industry news

Technical At the back

Features 26 Technical Guidance Note Level 2, No. 21: Design and
40 Diary dates
42 Spotlight on Structures
10 Designing for change: a new approach to residential detailing of base plates to steel columns
construction 44 Library update
45 Services Directory
47 TheStructuralEngineer Jobs
50 The Drawing Board

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TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 3

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p04_TSE.May19.indd 4 30/04/2019 14:42
 Upfront
thestructuralengineer.org Editorial

Editorial
Drawing interest
Robin Jones Managing Editor

A topic that has regularly come up in conversation since I started
work at the Institution has been the importance of sketching as
an engineering skill, whether to quickly put a concept across to
a client in a meeting, or to communicate details of the design
or construction method to other members of a project team.
But equally persistent has been the belief that it is a dying art
which needs to be encouraged among the younger generation of
structural engineers.
This was one of the reasons we launched our quarterly
sketching competition – The Drawing Board – in 2017. Judged by
a fine exponent of the art, Ron Slade of WSP, the regular slot aims
to showcase great examples of engineering sketching, and to
encourage others to turn their hand to it.
This month we feature two terrific examples (page 50), notable
for their use of colour and value as a communication tool.
Unfortunately, we can only reproduce them in part in print, so do
follow the links to see the sketches in full online.
And if you’re impressed by the winning entries, do also send us
your sketches for the next competition by 1 July. We’re keen to
see as many entries as possible. The lucky winner will receive an
e-book from the Institution’s current catalogue!
Elsewhere in this issue, we start with an article that feels
particularly topical at a time when climate change has been very
much in the news in the UK, thanks both to a BBC documentary
setting out the stark reality facing the planet, and to protests
in London organised by the group Extinction Rebellion. James
Lomas’ article, based on his Pai Lin Li Travel Award lecture
(page 10), examines the potential for the construction of
flexible housing, which would allow easier non-destructive
refurbishment and reduce the need to demolish and build anew.
Given the contribution of construction to carbon emissions, such
approaches could prove valuable in the future if they can be
widely adopted.
Other articles include a second Business Practice Note on
specifications, this time offering advice on how to prepare a robust
specification and avoid risks when re-using one from a previous
project (page 18). The Technical Guidance Notes series continues
with an article on designing and detailing base plates to steel
columns (page 26). And we also present a Viewpoint considering
whether the future of codes and standards will be performance-
based (page 30).
At the back, we have an update from the Library on publications
relating to structural failures (page 44) and also introduce an
exciting special issue of Structures on advanced manufacturing
and materials for innovative structural design (page 42).
I hope you enjoy the issue.

The Structural Engineer
 provides structural engineers and related
professionals worldwide with technical information
on practice, design, development, education and
training associated with the profession of structural
engineering, and offers a forum for discussion on
these matters
 promotes the learned society role of the Institution
by publishing peer-reviewed content which advances
the science and art of structural engineering
 provides members and non-members worldwide
with Institution and industry related news
 provides a medium for relevant advertising
The Institution The Structural Contributions published in The Structural Engineer are
 has over 31 000 members in over 100 countries Engineer (ISSN published on the understanding that the author/s is/are
around the world 1466-5123) is solely responsible for the statements made, for
 is the only qualifying body in the world concerned solely published by the opinions expressed and/or for the accuracy of
with the theory and practice of structural engineering IStructE Ltd, a the contents. Publication does not imply that any
 through its Chartered members is an internationally wholly owned statement or opinion expressed by the author/s
recognised source of expertise and information subsidiary of reflects the views of the Institution of Structural
concerning all issues that involve structural engineering The Institution Engineers’ Board; Council; committees; members
and public safety within the built environment of Structural or employees. No liability is accepted by such persons
 supports and protects the profession of structural Engineers. It is or by the Institution for any loss or damage, whether
engineering by upholding professional standards available both caused through reliance on any statement, opinion
and to act as an international voice on behalf of in print and or omission (textual or otherwise) in The Structural
structural engineers online. Engineer, or otherwise.

TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 5

TSE87_05_Editorial.indd 5 02/05/2019 11:41

 Upfront
Institution news
Institution election/transfer/reinstatement list:
18 March 2019
At a meeting of the Membership
Committee on 18 March 2019, the
following were elected/transferred/
reinstated in accordance with the
Institution’s Regulations:
ELECTIONS
Fellow Direct (1)
O’CALLAGHAN, James
Graduate (143)
Student Employed (4)
TRANSFERS
Member/Associate to Fellow (10)
BYRNE, Stephen Andrew
DONCHEV, Todor
EVANS, Daniel Robert
HUGHES, Philip Michael
HUTCHINSON, Stuart John
LENCZNER, Edward Alistair Ross
MASTERS, Kevin
PALMER, Matthew Edward
PUNDSACK, Mark Robin
WILLIAMS, Keith
Associate-Member to Member (1)
HOLLINGUM, Edward Spencer
Graduate to Member (14)
BASSETT, Daniel John
BROWN, George Robert
CLINTON, Tara
CROSSLAND, Nicholas Iestyn
GOOLD, Matthew Michael
KNEVITT, Clayton John
KYLE, Lauren
MOUNSEY, Roseanne
NG, Yu Fai
O’SULLIVAN, Nathan Luke
PEMBERTON, James
POZZETTI-HOLT, Lily Rose
SIMPSON, James Paul Joseph
WAINWRIGHT, Philip
Graduate to Associate (3)
KANE, Sean
PIETRA, Dario
WONG, Sing Kit
Graduate to Associate-Member (1)
BRITTAN, Adam
Student to Technician (9)
DAVIES, Barry Kevin
DAVIES, Michael
DESAI, Yogesh
GRINYER, Peter
MAHENDRA, Sonar
MORTON, Thomas
PATIL, Sujit
ROBSON, Daniel
6 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
TSE87_6_news.indd 6
SMITH, Aaron Luke COULSON, Rodney Richard
COUTTS, David Frazer
Student to Graduate (37) COYLE, John Michael
CUCKOW, David Everard
Free Students (1078) DAVIS, Keith Douglas
DAWE, Donald James
REINSTATEMENTS DOUBAL, Roger Jan
Fellow (1) DUCKENFIELD, Ian James
ROBERTSON, Leslie DYER, David John
ELY, Michael Terence
Member (3) ESPEZEL, Philip
FAZIL, Zohair EVANS, Justin James Bamford
MERII, Abdul Latif FARLEY, Colin William
RYAN, Martin FIELD, Brian Ronald
FISHER, Stephen James Crispin
Graduate (11) FITZPATRICK, John Anthony
ALSHARIF, Tareq FRASER, Ewen Stanley
ASHRAF, Jwad GALLARDO, Cristobal
BHAPKAR, Sunil GALUSZKA, Frank George
CHAN, Yiu Kong GASSON, Philip Rodney
GOLSHAN, Anahid GODWIN, Hayley Louise
HENLEY, Sean Alexander HEIGHINGTON, Peter Dennis
KHAN, Muhammad Fahad HELLAWELL, Robert Nigel
KONNARIDES, Nasos HEWITT, Frederick Leathley
MASON, Ben James HUANG, Adrian Joseph Zhao
TSANG, Tsz Kong JOLLY, Brian Kenneth
WANG, Yijin JONES, Brian
KINSMAN, Graham Anthony
Student Free (92) LAI, Tat Keung
LANE, Roger Ian
NOTICE LANG, Victor Jane Chee
RESIGNATIONS LANNING, Kelvin Jon
The Membership Committee has LAU, Chun Wah Peter
accepted, with regret, the following LEONG, Jen Yoon
resignations: MACKENZIE, Anthony William
MALPAS, Andrew
Fellow (12) MALTBY, Bruce
CHANA, Palvinder Singh MORREY, Graham Ward
CHANA, Surinder Singh MULLIGAN, Brendan Mark
EGGLESTON, Brian Charles NOBLE, Peter Barrie
GAJJAR, Chandrakant Damji NOONAN, James Gerard
GARDNER, Keith Raymond O’CLERY, Edward Andrew
HODGKINSON, Nicholas John OLDROYD, Peter Neil
HORTON, Peter Edward OTHICK, Geoffrey John
JOHNSON, Michael Russell PATEL, Kanu Bhai
MADDEN, Peter Brendan PAUL, Peter Richard
SAUNDERS, Jeffrey Roy PRESTON, Kenneth
SMITH, Russell Norman PRICE, Robert Norman
WEST, Alexander Rhodes RILEY, Charles Leonard
ROBINS, Paul
Member (76) ROBINSON, Colin Aubrey
ANWAR, Mohammed Ali ROWLAND, James
ARTHUR, Thomas Colin RUSHTON, Paul
BASHIR, Fazel RUTHERFORD, Robert
BENNETT, Edward SARKAR, Bimal Kumar
BIGG, Ian Alan SOUBRY, Michael Anthony
BURMAN, Alan David STROLZ, Gerhard
BURNS, David Anthony SWINNEY, Paul
BURWOOD, John William THOMAS, Don Michael
CAMPBELL, Alisdair John TOWERS, John
CHAPPELL, Digby John TOWNSEND, Barry
CHILES, John Henry TRISTRAM, Robert Martin
CLASBY, Douglas Alan WAIN, Nigel William
thestructuralengineer.org
WILLIAMS, Trevor
Associate-Member (13)
ASHALL, Clive John
CLARE, John Vincent
COLE, David
CUMMINGS, Stephen George
ENEVER, Keith
HARDEY, Alistair Graeme
HUXTABLE, David John Charles
JOHNSON, Brian Kevin
MCLAREN, James Graham
MITCHELL, Bernard Francis
PARSONS, Roy Clement
WAGSTAFF, Charles Michael
WATSON, Paul Winter
Graduate (36)
Student (9)
DEATHS
The deaths of the following are
reported with regret:
Honorary Fellow (1)
COSANDEY, Maurice
Fellow (16)
BOGGON, William George
BRYANT, Edward Percy Albert
CHOW, Ming Kuen Joseph
EGGLESTON, Brian Charles
EVANS, Edwin Frank
GLOYENS, Donald John
HEARD, Michael John
HORRIDGE, James Frederick
HURST, Bertram Lawrance
HUSSEY, John Patrick
MERRIMAN, Reginald John
PORTER, John Reid
TURNER, Robert William
WARD, William James
WILLIAMS, Ivor Frank
ZUNZ, Jack Gerhard Jacob
Member (13)
ANTHONY, Peter Leo
CHAN, Kwong Hou Thomas
CURRIE, Leonard George
FEAKES, Gerald William
HOOD, Derek Edward
MUNDAY, John Reginald
PETTETT, John Watling
PUDDEPHATT, George Ernest
STEVENS, Alan Leslie
THILWIND, John Howard
TSUI, Kin Man
WARE, Michael John
WOLFENDEN, Robin Tom
Graduate (1)
KHAMO, Henry
02/05/2019 10:34
 Upfront
thestructuralengineer.org Institution news

How do we achieve global interoperability

in a complex world?
Martin Powell Glenn Bell
Chief Executive, Institution of Structural Engineers President-Elect, Structural Engineering Institute

We live in a world complicated by the many standards and codes on
which we base our designs. We live in a world where the competences
and experiences of built environment professionals have been tested,
certified, licensed and accredited in different ways and to different
benchmarks. We live in a world where traditional materials are being
pushed to new levels of exposure and performance and where
innovative materials are being adopted without benefit of evaluation of
historic performance.
Place all of this into a world driven by cost and delivery pressure,
together with the demands of expectant clients, and we have every
reason to celebrate the successes of iconic structures.
That, however, is only part of the story. It is important that we look
beyond the ‘wow’ of our triumphs and learn how the construction
experts involved in these structures overcame conflicting challenges:
how they took forward decisions that pushed the boundaries of
materials, codes and standards in the achievement of their projects.
The learning experience from others and the transfer of knowledge
is an essential element in our ability to meet the future demands and
expectations in the countries where individually we live and work.
The excitement surrounding our iconic structures, and the certain
knowledge that some of their novel methods will eventually filter into
and influence more modest structures, places an obligation on the
profession to think through and address the structural safety of our
decision making. Surely this is the prime consideration for us all and the
fundamental obligation we have in service to the public at large.
This is why, for the first time in our histories, the Institution of
Structural Engineers (IStructE) and the Structural Engineering Institute
(SEI) of the American Society of Civil Engineers have combined their
experience and outreach to host a joint international conference: Iconic
Global Structures – What Can We Learn?
With keynote speakers and in-depth panels, we will explore in
detail nine different iconic structures, to compare and contrast how
similar structures were executed in various places in the world, what
worked well, what challenges were faced and what the project team
might do differently next time. The conference will take place in Dubai,
an iconic hub and the perfect location in which to consider global
iconic structures: where east meets west and north meets south, well
demonstrated in the veracity and dynamism of its buildings.
As the IStructE and SEI look increasingly at the opportunities and
importance of breaking down international barriers to the sharing of
knowledge, Dubai is very much the place to be this September. We
hope you’ll join us, along with many construction industry experts, to
help drive forward the discussion and debate.
Find out more at https://structuresdubai2019.cvent.com.

Website update: Five changes you can expect

All through 2019 everyone at
the Institution has been working
hard to prepare our new website
for launch. Colleagues from
across departments have been
collaborating to ensure that
the new site launches with the
resources and information you
expect, under a new brand
that better reflects the modern
profession. Here, we highlight
just a few of the improvements to
expect on the new site.
The Structural Engineer front
and centre
We know that The Structural
Engineer magazine is one of
the membership benefits you
most value. You’ll now find the
magazine and archive are an
integral part of the site.
An integrated bookshop
Our bookshop holds some of our
best content – we’re delighted
to say that on the new site you’ll
be able to access all the great
manuals, guides and guidance
notes previously accessible at
shop.istructe.org via the main site.
Tagged, pooled, searchable
resources
In addition to bookshop items,
we’re bringing together all our
webinars, case studies, opinion
pieces and online training in one
searchable location – tagged by
subject, so you can find related
content more easily.
Printable event pages
If you’re planning an event
through your Regional Group and
want to put up posters, you’ll be
able to print off the event page
in a ready-to-go, branded flyer
format – a simple way to save
your precious time and spread the
Institution’s new brand.
Easier membership applications
We’re aware that our current
process could use improvement.
That’s why we’re refreshing
the application process for
Student, Graduate and Chartered
Membership to make it a smooth,
one-visit process, without the
need to download forms and
submit via email. This improved
feature will roll out in the months
following launch.
More to come…
These are only some specific
improvements: from the moment
the site launches we’ll be
continuing to develop, supporting
your needs throughout your
career.
We’ll keep you updated on
social media and via email as we
move towards our launch. Expect
further information about the
new brand coming soon – and
thank you again to all members
who contributed their time to our
website project.

TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 7

TSE87_07_Institution News.indd 7 02/05/2019 10:35

 Upfront
Industry news thestructuralengineer.org

Major construction sector firms suspended Revised edition of British Standard

from UK Prompt Payment Code
Six major engineering and
construction businesses have
been suspended from the UK’s
Prompt Payment Code (PPC) for
not paying their suppliers in line
with the Code, the Chartered
Institute of Credit Management
(CICM) has announced. The
companies in the construction
sector are:
 Balfour Beatty Plc
 Costain Limited
 Interserve Construction
 Kellogg Brown & Root Limited
 Laing O’Rourke
 Persimmon Homes Limited.
All six suspended firms have
committed to make changes to
meet the standards of the Code
and pay suppliers promptly.
Businesses suspended from
the Code are invited to produce
an action plan setting out how
they will achieve compliance
with the Code within an agreed
period. When they have achieved
compliance their status as a Code
signatory will be reinstated. If they
do not, then they will be removed.
Companies which sign up to
the Code, administered by CICM
on behalf of the UK government,
pledge to uphold its best practice
for payment standards in order
to help end the culture of late
payment, particularly for small
businesses. This includes a
commitment to pay 95% of all
supplier invoices within 60 days.
The suspensions follow a
government announcement
in November that failure to
demonstrate prompt payment
to their suppliers could result in
companies being prevented from
winning government contracts.
From 1 September 2019,
any supplier which bids for a
government contract above
£5M per annum will be required
to answer questions about
its payment practices and
performance. The expected
standard is to pay 95% of
invoices in 60 days across all their
business.
For further details, see www.
cicm.com/quarterly-update-17-
businesses-removed-suspended-
prompt-payment-code-failing-
pay-suppliers-time/.
on fire safety engineering released
BSI has published a new edition of the British Standard for
fire safety engineering: BS 7974:2019 Application of fire safety
engineering principles to the design of buildings. The updated
standard has been significantly revised since the 2001 edition,
in response to major changes within the fire and construction
industry sector, working practices and the regulatory framework,
as well as new research.
The principal changes include:
 the incorporation of recommendations previously contained in
PD 7974-0:2002 and PD 7974-8:2012
 a greater emphasis on the competence of the fire safety
engineer
 additional recommendations for the quality assurance and
verification of fire safety engineering reports
 simplified and consolidated terminology.
The standard sets out a reporting methodology which allows
for a design to be readily assessed by approval bodies. It is
intended to facilitate the practice of fire safety engineering and, in
particular, to:
 provide the designer with a disciplined approach to fire safety
design
 allow the safety levels for alternative designs to be compared
 provide a basis for selection of appropriate fire protection
systems
 provide opportunities for innovative design
 provide information and assessment methods to support the
design, construction, management and operation of buildings.
For further details, visit https://shop.bsigroup.com/ProductDeta
il/?pid=000000000030353758.

New study reveals recruitment challenges faced by engineering construction industry

New research into the engineering
construction labour market has revealed
the challenges facing employers in this
vital sector of the UK economy.
With the industry set to grow by
33 000 jobs in the next decade,
employers told researchers working on
behalf of the Engineering Construction
Industry Training Board (ECITB) that
they were not confident they would
meet recruitment targets and identified
a growing skills gap exacerbated by
an ageing workforce and low supply of
appropriately trained new starters.
The forecast increase in demand for
skilled workers stems from hundreds of
billions of pounds-worth of investment
in UK infrastructure projects over the
next decade. As the industry responsible
for designing, building and maintaining
our critical national infrastructure, from
oil and gas platforms to nuclear power
stations and wind farms, the engineering
construction sector must find a way to
recruit more talented people. However,
the research published by the ECITB
presents a tightening labour market
where companies struggle to recruit
candidates with the right skills.
Key findings
 One-third of employers (35%) expect
to grow their workforce over the next
three years, while only 5% expect it to
reduce in size.
 Employers believe the skills gap will
stay the same (43%) or get worse
(44%) over the next three years.
 More than half of employers (55%)
see the ageing and retiring workforce
as the main reason for the skills gap.
The research shows that 31% of
employees are over 50, but only 12%
are under 25.
 Women are hugely underrepresented
in engineering construction, comprising
just 12.5% of the workforce.
 Employers said they found it difficult
to recruit because applicants lack the
required skills and experience (81%) or
don’t have the right qualifications for
many industry roles (54%).
 Employers also highlighted a
competitive market for skilled
engineers, with 62% fearing losing
recruits to competitors paying higher
salaries.
 Just under a third of employers
(29%) felt restrictions on freedom of
movement after Brexit would make
recruitment more difficult.
Read the full report at www.ecitb.org.
uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/LMI-
2019_LabourMarketOutlook_Final.pdf.

8 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

TSE87_8_Industry news.indd 8 02/05/2019 10:36

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 Feature
Pai Lin Li Travel Award thestructuralengineer.org

Designing for change:

a new approach to residential
construction
James Lomas
BEng, MEng
Structural Engineer, WSP

Synopsis
In this paper, James Lomas, winner
of the Pai Lin Li Travel Award 2017,
discusses his research into flexible
design initiatives around the world.
James examines schemes in the
Netherlands, Japan and Malaysia,
and considers what the UK
construction industry could learn
from these initiatives.
FRANS VAN GASSEL

Introduction
England has one of the oldest housing
stocks in Europe: one in five dwellings (as of
2014) was built before 19191. The demolition
rate in England has halved over the last 10
years to 10 420 per year or 0.045% of the
current housing stock2. These statistics
strongly suggest that, with housing in
such high demand, there is a reluctance to
demolish residential structures and, instead,
a willingness to refurbish and maintain them
well beyond their intended design lives. This is
supported by refurbishment statistics which
estimate that 41% of all residences have
undergone at least one major alteration (72%
of pre-1919 housing stock), mostly to increase
size3.
Nearly all housing in England (approx. 91%)3
is constructed using either solid masonry
or masonry cavity construction. Masonry
construction provides poor internal and
facade flexibility, as exterior walls and internal
partitions are loadbearing. Additionally,
masonry-to-masonry connections are formed
from cementitious ‘wet’ joints, which are
 Figure 1
IFD Today project
England is inherently inflexible. this trip, I interviewed ‘experts in the field’,
Apart from benefiting the occupants, there including architects, government advisers,
are compelling environmental reasons to academics, construction managers and
design residential structures with extended engineers. I also visited factories, construction
lives. The provision of flexible housing would sites and completed buildings to understand
allow easier non-destructive refurbishment
and could lead to a further reduction in
demolition rates.
A number of countries, such as Japan
and the Netherlands, have conducted
research and launched nationwide initiatives
that attempt to incorporate flexibility into
residential construction. This was often
undertaken to increase the ‘functional’
lifespan of buildings and their usability to
occupants. Separately, Malaysia is undergoing
its own nationwide programme to introduce
industrialised building practices into its
construction industry and to promote open
building systems.
FRANS VAN GASSEL

difficult to dismantle or change in a non- I travelled to these three countries in

destructive way. Thus, despite a growing
need for long-life housing that is able to
adapt to the varying requirements of different
occupants, nearly all existing housing stock in
February/March 2018 to investigate the range
of adaptable design initiatives that have been
trialled, and the cultural, economic and social
motivations that have directed them. During
 Figure 2
Modular cladding system being installed

10 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

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the practicalities of incorporating flexibility into
design. This article summarises my findings
and suggests how flexible design could be
introduced more widely in the UK.
The Netherlands
IFD programme
The Industrial Flexible Demountable (IFD)
experimental building programme ran in the
Netherlands between 1999 and 2006. It
was created by the Steering Committee for
Experiments in Public Housing and was partly
funded by grants from the Ministry of Housing,
Spatial Planning and Environment and the
Ministry of Economic Affairs. The programme
included 69 projects (34 residential) and
aimed to encourage innovation in the Dutch
construction industry and adoption of IFD
construction methods4.
IFD design incorporates three main
concepts: ‘Industrial’ refers to prefabricated
components that are assembled onsite;
‘Flexible’ refers to a building’s ability to be
adapted according to the varying wishes
of the user; and ‘Demountable’ refers to
the design of a building in which individual
components can be removed and replaced
without damaging other parts of the
structure4. Some example projects are
described below.
IFD Today
The IFD Today trial module (Eindhoven)
was the product of a collaboration between
the Amis housing corporation, contractor
Heijmans and Eindhoven University of
Technology. The module (Figure 1) was built to
investigate the practicalities of construction
using IFD techniques and the possibility of
using the systems trialled on a large-scale
apartment project5.
The trial module is 14m × 11m on plan and
two stories high. The steel-framed building
TSE87_10-17_Pai Lin Li Travel Award.indd 11
N Figure 3
De Meeuw modular
floor with underfloor
heating before
concrete slab is
poured
 Figure 4
Completed De Meeuw module
contains no loadbearing internal walls, and
uses a hollow dry-jointed floor system with a
flexible service zone for piping and electrical
wiring. Services are transferred between
floors using easily accessible risers located
between bracing members. The floor panels
are formed of deep girders with cellular
openings to allow adequate drainage falls
from numerous locations within the dwelling.
This facilitates changes to the positions of the
bathrooms and kitchen. These innovations
allow users the flexibility to change the
internal layout of their homes and the services
that supply them5.
The IFD Today project also incorporates a
modular cladding system which allows easy
installation (and deconstruction) of a number
of facade types5 (Figure 2). The project
ultimately did not progress pass the prototype
stage.
De Meeuw and Flexline
The Flexline trial housing project and the De
Meeuw IFD system both utilise volumetric
modular construction to assemble buildings
rapidly on site. This form of construction
encompasses the manufacture of ‘three-
dimensional’ (3D) modules in a factory
environment, before they are transported
to site and assembled. Modules often arrive
fully furnished with ‘plug and play’ features
installed so that cables, pipes and other
services can be connected easily and
quickly. The floors are typically formed from
80mm thick concrete slabs supported on
cold-formed steel channels, which limits the
response of the floors compared to timber
joist solutions6 (Figures 3 and 4).
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"ANY SINGLE MODULE IS
INTENDED TO BE USED IN
MULTIPLE BUILDINGS OVER
ITS LIFESPAN"
Flexline attempted to offer customers an
opportunity to change the size, layout, facade
and finishes of dwellings. This proved very
expensive and difficult to achieve in practice,
and the project struggled to incorporate
components from other companies. The
houses were also designed to be expanded
during their service life, through the addition of
further modules6.
The project was stopped after 18
houses had been completed, rather than
the 50 originally planned, due to spiralling
construction costs. The 18 houses cost an
estimated €3.1M6.
The De Meeuw IFD system has been more
successful by comparison and is still in use
today. It is mostly used to construct semi-
permanent structures (up to 10 years) and
its business model utilises circular economy
principles: any single module is intended to be
used in multiple buildings over its lifespan7.
Once a building is ready for deconstruction,
modules are transported back to the factory,
refurbished, repaired and reused; De Meeuw
estimates that 80% of a module is recycled
between projects. Modules can be modified
and arranged to suit varying requirements
and layouts, with the option for buildings to be
easily extended or reduced in size during their
lifespans7.
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MARK VAN DEN BERG
Figure 5
Nursing home being stripped out before deconstruction
De Groop Vroomshoop
De Groop Vroomshoop is a manufacturing
company that specialises in prefabricated
building components. The company’s IFD dry-
jointed modular building system is still in use
today and was designed for semi-permanent
buildings with lifespans of up to 15 years8.
The system comprises standardised
components, including precast slabs (typically
7.2m × 2.4/3.6m), steel columns with generic
support brackets, precast foundations and
timber facade panels (Figures 5–7).
The system is designed so that elements
can be easily disassembled after use,
repaired and reused on different projects.
The standardised, modular nature of the
system lends itself to multiple layouts and
functions and has been used not only for
accommodation, but also for healthcare,
commercial and education purposes8.
A typical connection is shown in Fig. 6.
MARK VAN DEN BERG
 Figure 6
Groop
Vroomshoop
connection detail
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Each column element is secured in place
by a bolted connection that partially screws
into the precast slabs above and below. The
building system is currently limited to four
stories and is stabilised by cross-bracing that
can be concealed inside internal partitions8.
Post-IFD
A move towards an industrialised building
sector has been the main legacy of the IFD
programme. In the Netherlands, it is estimated
that approx. 20% of all new housing uses
some kind of wood or concrete prefabrication
(compared to 9% in Germany and 5% in the
UK)9. This continued push for industrialisation
appears to have been mostly driven by a lack
of skilled labour and the subsequent rising
labour costs. How much the IFD programme
contributed to this rise is not easily
quantifiable.
The rise in industrialisation has
 Figure 7
Building system
under construction
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inadvertently led to greater levels of flexibility
in the Netherlands. Companies such as
MorgenWonen and ERA Contour allow buyers
to customise their prefabricated homes
before completion, giving them the ability to
determine facade panels, dwelling dimensions,
position of windows and roof type10,11.
However, the widespread introduction of
flexible (post-initial user) and demountable
design has not been realised in the Dutch
construction industry. Many of the IFD
projects that were conceived failed to
progress past the prototype stage and much
of the conceptual thinking has not translated
into a meaningful shift towards flexible
demountable design4. One likely cause of this
is that those stakeholders with the greatest
influence over incorporating flexibility into
design (e.g. clients and contractors) are often
the ones least incentivised to do so. Benefit
to the developer would only materialise if an
adaptable home was either easier to sell or
generated a higher revenue; neither of which
have been proven to date12.
The additional cost required to incorporate
flexible design into buildings is not easy to
quantify and depends on the chosen system.
A lack of quantitative evidence on the cost
benefits of developing adaptable buildings
has likely hampered the wider incorporation of
flexible features.
Summary
The Netherlands embarked on an ambitious
experimental building project between 1999
and 2006 in an attempt to incorporate IFD
principles more widely into its construction
sector. The result was 34 innovative
FRANS VAN GASSEL
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E Figure 8
Katsura Imperial Villa, Kyoto embodies many
aspects of traditional Japanese construction
residential projects that demonstrated one
or more of these principles4. Innovative
approaches that were widely incorporated
included ‘2D’ and ‘3D’ modular elements that
promoted ‘standardised choice’ for users.
The IFD programme can be judged to have
been of limited success. An un-incentivised
construction sector chose to only retain IFD
features that generated short-term profits,
including increased off-site production and,
with it, a reasonable level of customisation
for the initial user. The IFD scheme failed
to prove there was a sufficient market for
adaptable features in homes that would allow
customisation over time, and hence these
have been largely abandoned by the industry.
This lack of uptake has also been attributed
to the fact that project stakeholders, with the
greatest influence over incorporating flexibility
into construction, are often the ones who are
least incentivised to do so12.
One area that has retained these features is
the semi-permanent building sector. De Groot
Vroomshoop and De Meeuw are examples
of companies that have pioneered their own
demountable modular systems, which allow
entire buildings to be deconstructed, before
 Figure 9
Summary of some major adaptable
housing initiatives in Japan14
WILEY
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components are recycled and reused to meet
future changing demands7,8.
Japan
Culture and background
Japanese residential construction has
historically embodied flexible and adaptable
design (Figure 8). Traditional Japanese
homes are constructed with non-loadbearing
partitions supported on a repeating grid
of thin timber columns. Standardised infill
components (e.g. tatami mats, doors)
are sized to suit, which allows them to
be removed, stored or replaced by the
occupant13.
Timber-based construction decreased
after World War II, following the devastation
caused by Allied bombing and subsequent
widespread fires14. The war resulted in a
deficit of 4M homes and a vast public house-
building scheme followed in the 1950s. These
homes were mostly mass-produced, poor-
quality, inflexible dwellings and it wasn’t until
the 1970s – when capacity overtook supply
– that higher-quality homes began to be
constructed in large numbers14. It was at this
point that Japan’s government commenced a
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series of adaptable housing projects to help
improve the housing stock. The most recent
initiative, The Act for the Promotion of Long
Life Housing, came into force in 200914.
Japan’s demographic shifts and wasteful
housing sector have necessitated a change
towards adaptable housing. Japan has a
declining and ageing population: 38% of its
civilians are predicted to be older than 65 by
2065 and its population is currently set to
reduce to 51M by 2115, from 128.1M in 200815.
Despite a falling population and, by
extension, an oversupply of homes, the
reuse of housing represents just 15% of the
current housing market14. In the year 2000,
the average lifespan of a house in Japan was
approx. 30 years, compared to 77 years in
the UK13. This ‘scrap and build’ culture has
developed from Japan’s experience with
poor-quality homes and has led to the rapid
devaluing of housing over time. Japan’s ageing
population means that it will be hard to build
the next generation of accommodation14. This,
combined with environmental targets and
the aim to improve the quality of homes, has
led to flexible housing schemes intended to
encourage Japanese people to reuse housing
instead of replacing it.
A number of initiatives have been created to
promote longevity in the housing market, such
as the Kodan Experimental Housing Project
(KEP) (1973) and the 200-year housing
programme (2006)13. Some of these schemes
are described in greater detail below. The long
history of adaptable housing programmes in
Japan provides an opportunity to examine
how these initiatives have performed during
their operational lifespans. A summary of
some of these programmes is shown in
Figure 9.
Kodan Experimental housing Project
The KEP was a private venture initiated by the
Japanese Housing Corporation in 1973 (with
the backing of the Ministry of Construction)
to investigate how flexibility and adaptability
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 Figure 10
NEXT21 project in Osaka18
could be incorporated into housing. The
experiment involved the development of
movable partitions and storage systems,
which would allow occupants to easily change
the spatial layouts of their apartments to fit
their changing needs14.
Research undertaken to investigate the
effectiveness of the system examined the
KEP Tama New Town housing project, which
contained 192 apartments. The research
revealed that over their 32-year lifespan (2014
study), 54% of the units that were fitted with
KEP movable partitions had undergone some
change in room layout, compared with 8% of
those not fitted with KEP movable partitions.
These changes to the room layout were
mostly to increase the size of living rooms/
bedrooms, often as children either grew or left
home, or as families moved into new homes.
Some residents complained about rusting or
faulty fixings and the poor sound insulation
NEXT21
TABLE 1: FIVE CHS CATEGORIES OF COMPONENTS BASED ON SERVICE LIFESPAN17
Type of component
Structure
Roofs, exterior doors and windows
Moveable partitions and furniture
Home appliances, piping and wiring
Lightbulbs and sealants
14
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caused by the jointing of the KEP walls. They
felt that these problems were not worth the
opportunity to adjust a wall partition once in
a decade16.
Century Housing System
The Century Housing System (CHS),
introduced in 1988 by the Ministry of
Construction, followed the KEP14. Unlike the
KEP, the CHS programme was government-
led and comprised a five-volume certification
guidebook and accreditation process. Those
purchasing a CHS-accredited property could
qualify for a preferential loan programme,
leading to savings of up to 1M yen (approx.
£5400 today) per unit17.
The process involved dividing building
systems into five categories depending
on their expected service lifespan17 (Table
1). The purpose of this subdivision is that
components with short design lives can
be easily removed and replaced, without
damaging longer-life components. This
facilitated easy refurbishment and reduced
the chance of the building becoming
 Figure 11
Structural frame of functionally obsolete.
NEXT21 project18
The incorporation of CHS principles into
Japanese construction was poor: over a
16-year period, as few as 40 projects were
completed using this system. The lack of
Service lifespan (years) projects completed was partially attributed
to the five component levels being too
50–100 complicated, which caused confusion for
25–50 many developers. This later developed into
the simpler ‘support’ and ‘infill’ system used
12–25 in the NEXT21 project. The confusion was
6–12 compounded by general, non-technical
guidance that was initially intended to allow
3–6
flexibility for developers17.
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NEXT21
The NEXT21 scheme is an experimental
housing project constructed in 1993 by the
Osaka Gas Company for its employees and
their families (Figure 10). The intention of the
project was to demonstrate how multi-unit
sustainable housing could be designed to
satisfy the changing needs of its users over
time. The building is five stories high with a
basement and contains 18 dwellings18.
The project is based on a skeleton-infill
principle, a simplified version of the CHS, in
which a durable reinforced concrete frame
makes up the ‘skeleton’ (Figure 11), and
the interior fit-out is the infill, which can be
removed and replaced without affecting the
structural frame. The ‘skeleton’ is formed from
precast elements and designed for a 100-year
lifespan. The structure is stabilised by its
rigid frame and is designed to be earthquake
resistant and to accommodate a high floor
load, enabling future changes of use. The
typical floor-to-floor height is 3.6m, allowing
for a standard 240mm zone for a raised floor
and a hung ceiling18.
All services are easily accessible
throughout the building to aid maintenance
and to help facilitate changes of use. There
are only two communal risers servicing the
building, which are accessible from each floor
in communal corridors. To compensate for
such a small number of risers, 600mm deep
service ‘trenches’ accommodated in slab
steps run beneath communal corridors to
‘feed’ individual apartments (Figure 12)18.
The NEXT21 modular cladding system
was designed to be easily removed and
replaced. The project has undergone three
major renovations since its inception18. During
these, the facade was altered with balconies
replaced to form a new exterior wall.
Act for the Promotion of Long-Life Quality
Housing
The Act for the Promotion of Long-Life
Quality Housing is the most recent flexible
housing initiative to be implemented in Japan.
It came into force in June 2009 along with
technical guidance required for accreditation,
integrating lessons learned from the previous
housing systems (e.g. CHS, KEP)14. The Act
eliminated advice on the internal fit-outs
of dwellings present in previous schemes,
including moveable internal partitions and the
overly complicated five levels of components
in the CHS.
The technical guidance included a number
of requirements:
 A building’s structure should be designed
for a 100-year design life and should last
150–200 years with further maintenance19.
TSE87_10-17_Pai Lin Li Travel Award.indd 15
 The structure should be designed to limit
damage caused by uncommonly strong
earthquakes and to allow for easy repair
(while occupied) in the aftermath. This
can be achieved by isolating the building
at its base or by controlling deformation
during large earthquakes, e.g. floor-to-floor
deformation should be limited to 1/100 of
the height during large-scale earthquakes19.
 The replacement and maintenance of
services are facilitated by incorporating
easily accessible service risers/zones
outside of residences16. Risers should also
be designed with additional capacity for
more piping.
 Homes should be adequately proportioned
to facilitate changes in the lifestyle of
occupants, including the ability to modify
room layouts and adjust mechanical,
electrical and plumbing services as required
(e.g. a minimum floor-to-ceiling height of
2.65m)19.
 Maintenance plans for structural,
waterproofing and drainage systems must
be put in place and inspections carried out
at least every 10 years19.
Unlike previous schemes, tax incentives
were offered to those buying a property
complying with the Act, including an income
tax exemption of up to 5M yen (approx. £40
000) over 10 years. Subsidies of up to 10%
of the construction costs (or 1M yen (approx.
£6700)) were also offered to small- and
medium-sized housebuilders19.
By the end of March 2017, nearly 808 000
Long-Life Quality Housing dwellings had been
constructed in Japan, representing significant
support for the government initiative14. The
high uptake is likely linked to the relatively
modest list of requirements needed to
comply with the Act.
Difficult-to-achieve
demands (such
as the moveable
partitions) were
abandoned for
specifications that
the industry would
accept.
Summary
Japan has
experimented with
flexible housing
for nearly 50 years
as a way to tackle
E Figure 12
NEXT21
Accessible deep
service zone under
corridor18
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demographic changes and poor average
housing lifespans. These initiatives have
yielded mixed results, and have demonstrated
the difficulties of influencing a private
construction sector with government policy.
Best practices have emerged over time, and
overbearing policies have been left behind.
Lessons learned were used to influence the
Act for the Promotion of Long-Life Quality
Housing, which was launched in 2009 with a
high uptake from the construction industry.
The simplified technical guidance utilising
a skeleton-infill approach seems to have
been largely influenced by the 25-year-old
NEXT21 project. It is too early to tell how
these policies will perform over time; however,
there is concern that policy has shifted to
accommodate industry preferences to a point
where the flexible features are no longer as
effective.
Malaysia
Introduction
The Malaysian government has championed
Industrialised Building Systems (IBS) over
the last decade as a way of modernising
the Malaysian construction industry. The
vast majority of IBS construction in Malaysia
involves the assembly of precast concrete
components that have been prefabricated
offsite20. This is a historically inflexible form of
construction, which could be improved by the
use of ‘open system’ building.
Malaysia has attempted to encourage IBS
construction since the 1960s, but has only
recently introduced sweeping government
legislation to force the construction industry
to comply20. A combination of tax incentives
and mandated IBS levels for both private and
government projects has forced an industry
which typically relies on cheap labour to
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a) Model of
completed
project
embrace IBS construction methods. In 2016,
an estimated 72% (4851 projects) of private-
sector developments were designated ‘IBS
projects’21.
When it was first introduced in the 1960s,
IBS was intended to help address the
chronic shortage of housing in Malaysia.
More recently, it has been promoted as a
way to decrease Malaysia’s dependence on
foreign unskilled labour20. Official documents
describe a ‘host of problems’ associated
with such dependence, including ‘low quality
works, delays, wastages, social problems,
disease, etc.’22.
The adoption of IBS technologies has
historically been hampered both by public
perception and the low wages associated
with the Malaysian construction sector20. The
availability of cheap labour has encouraged
construction companies to continue to use
traditional construction and avoid investment
in higher (initial)-cost, riskier IBS processes.
Problems with public perception include the
assumption that the joints of IBS projects leak
and that IBS projects cannot be renovated20.
De Bayu affordable housing project
The De Bayu affordable housing project
(Figure 13) is a typical IBS construction
project in Shah Alam. The project is being
undertaken by leading property developer S.P.
Setia Berhad and comprises 723 apartments
in three 15- to 17-storey buildings. Apartments
are intended to retail at 200 000 ringgits
(approx. £37 000). The project achieved
over 70% on its IBS score, meaning that it is
entitled to a tax reduction of 0.12% of its value.
The project is typical of IBS projects in
Malaysia and each building is formed of
stacked precast reinforced concrete panels
that sit on a transfer grid at the first floor.
Foundations are piled and constructed
traditionally. The panels are installed very
16
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WN Figure 13
De Bayu affordable
housing project
quickly at a rate of 18 to 20 per day (six units).
These affordable units are low-quality homes
with no sound or thermal isolation provided
between apartments or externally (which
is typical in Malaysia). The painted faces of
the precast panels form both the cladding
of the apartment buildings and the internal
walls. This form of construction is inherently
inflexible in many ways:
 Loadbearing walls break up apartment
spaces and prevent the changing of room
layouts and facade.
 Ducting and electricity cables are installed
into precast walls and in situ floors, thereby
preventing changes to services and
electrical systems.
 The floor-to-ceiling height is 2.70m without
raised floors or hanging ceilings. Exposed
walls, floors and ceilings are painted
precast concrete, restricting the possibility
of retrofitting services at a later date.
 Wall panels are welded together in grouted
pockets and the 150mm slabs are installed
with a 50mm in situ topping (to avoid leaks),
preventing panels being demounted and
replaced at any time.
 All structural elements and foundations are
designed for their current service loads,
which doesn’t allow for changes of use.
Open building systems
The Malaysian government has sought to
encourage ‘open’ building systems as part
of its promotion of IBS construction. The
aim of open building systems is to try and
standardise components and connections
across the industry, promoting more
competition (driving up quality and reducing
cost)20.
Open building systems are not unique to
Malaysia. In other countries, they have been
used to boost flexibility and customisation
for homeowners by allowing users to repair/
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b) Precast wall
panel being
installed
replace standard components with new ones
or extend dwellings where required.
This opportunity appears to have been
missed in Malaysia, as nearly all open building
systems (like a typical IBS system) use wet
(chemical) joints, meaning that, once installed,
components cannot easily be removed and
replaced. The Malaysian government is not
currently specifying any level of open system
in IBS projects, so the majority of projects in
Malaysia remain ‘closed’ and dominated by
large contractors.
Summary
The Malaysian government’s radical,
pro-industrial reforms to its construction
industry can be considered a success, with
an estimated 72% of private-sector projects
designated IBS projects in 201621. This push
for off-site, prefabricated construction offered
an opportunity for Malaysian designers to
adopt flexible building systems (as was seen
in the IFD programme in the Netherlands).
However, these opportunities have been
broadly missed (including with ‘open system’
building).
Malaysia has prioritised loadbearing
reinforced concrete wall systems with wet
(chemical) joints that are inherently inflexible.
This preference has been formed from both
economic necessity (precast reinforced
concrete panels with no insulation or cladding
are a viable way to build mass housing in a
developing country) and cultural preference
(wet joints are seen as an efficient way to
combat leakage problems).
Conclusion
The construction sectors in all three countries
have resisted the incorporation of adaptable
design into residential projects, often opting
instead for low-cost or traditional methods of
construction. This resistance has been linked
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to the additional costs of construction and
the unclear benefits of faster or higher-value
sales. IBS projects in Malaysia are extreme
examples of this, with future flexibility being
ignored in exchange for the cheaper, faster,
industrialised construction of low-quality
housing. Government policy and funding have
been used in the Netherlands and Japan
to encourage the use of innovative flexible
building systems with varying success.
Japan first began trialling adaptable
housing in the 1970s, but has only recently
succeeded in the widespread adoption
of modest flexible building standards.
Japan’s history of adaptable housing has
demonstrated that any policy attempting
to encourage adaptable design has to
be appropriately targeted and properly
incentivised.
The Netherlands’ IFD building programme
was more conceptual by contrast and
resulted in the successful completion
of 69 innovative trial projects of varying
scope and size. Innovations included ‘2D’
and ‘3D’ modular elements that promoted
‘standardised choice’ for users.
REFERENCES
E 1) Department of Communities and Local
Government (2016) English Housing Survey:
Housing Stock Report 2014–2015 [Online]
Available at: https://assets.publishing.service.
gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/
attachment_data/file/539600/Housing_Stock_
report.pdf (Accessed: October 2018)
E 2) Ministry of Housing, Communities
and Local Government (2017) Table 120:
Components of housing supply: Net additional
dwellings, England 2006-2007 to 2015-16
[Online] Available at: www.gov.uk/government/
statistical-data-sets/live-tables-on-net-supply-
of-housing (Accessed: October 2018)
E 3) Department of Communities and Local
Government (2010) English Housing Survey:
Housing Stock Report 2008 [Online] Available
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uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/
attachment_data/file/6703/1750754.pdf
(Accessed: October 2018)
E 4) Geraedts R. (2010) ‘Success and Failure
in Flexible Building; Flexible Input Leads to
Flexible Output’, International Conference on
Sustainable Open Building, Bilbao, Spain, May
E 5) Van Gassel F. (2003) ‘Experiences with the
Design and Production of an Industrial, Flexible
and Demountable (IFD) Building System’, Proc.
20th ISARC, Eindhoven, Holland pp. 209–214
[Online] Available at: https://doi.org/10.22260/
ISARC2003/0039 (Accessed: 3 April 2019)
E 6) Crone J. et al. (2017) Leren Door
Demonstreren. De oogst van zeven jaar
Industrieel Fexibel en Demontabel Bouwen,
TSE87_10-17_Pai Lin Li Travel Award.indd 17
These projects failed to incentivise the
wider building sector to incorporate flexible
systems. The exception to this was when
clear short-term financial benefits were
present; examples include semi-permanent
structures (where there is a guaranteed
opportunity to recycle building components)
and the customisation of new factory-made
homes.
With prefabrication rising in the UK, the
IFD scheme can provide insight into how
prefabricated, modular components can
be used to create customisable, flexible,
high-quality homes. The UK construction
industry should avoid abandoning flexible
design in favour of short-term profits, as
the Netherlands construction industry has
done, and instead understand and fully
embrace its potential benefits. This said,
it is worth noting that adaptable housing
is still in its infancy and there is a lack of
quantitative evidence that users are willing
to pay more for adaptable homes, or would
see the benefit if they did. Further research
is required to confirm its long-term financial
benefits.
Rotterdam: SEV realisatie
E 7) De Meeuw website (2018) [Online]
Available at: www.demeeuw.com/en/
(Accessed: March 2018)
E 8) De Groot Vroomshoop website
(2018) [Online] Available at: https://
degrootvroomshoop.nl/ (Accessed: April 2018)
E 9) Sweet R. (2015) Why Sweden beats the
world hands down on prefab housing [Online]
Available at: www.globalconstructionreview.
com/trends/why-sweden-beats-world-
h8an0ds-4d2own0-6p4r2e0f8ab/ (Accessed:
April 2018)
E 10) Era Contour (2018) beterBASIShuis
[Online] Available at: www.beterbasishuis.nl/
beterbasishuis/ (Accessed: April 2018)
E 11) MorgenWonen website (2018) [Online]
Available at: www.morgenwonen.nl/ (Accessed:
April 2018)
E 12) Pinder J., Schmidt R. and Saker J. (2013)
‘Stakeholder perspectives on developing more
adaptable buildings’, Construct. Manage. Econ.,
31 (5), pp. 440–459
E 13) Eguchi T., Schmidt R., Dainty A.,
Austin S. and Gibb A. (2011) ‘The Cultivation
of Adaptability in Japan’, Open House
International, 36 (1), pp. 73–85
E 14) Lifschutz A. (ed.) (2017) Loose-Fit
Architecture: Designing Buildings for Change’,
Oxford: Wiley
E 15) Harding R. (2017) Japan’s population set to
fall to 88m by 2065 [Online] Available at: www.
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019
Feature
Pai Lin Li Travel Award
Japan’s Act for the Promotion of Long-Life
Quality Housing in 2009 proposed a series of
relatively modest modifications that could be
reasonably incorporated into either the UK’s
building codes or environmental standards,
without substantial costs being incurred by
developers. Environmental building standards
(e.g. BREEAM’s functional adaptability credit)
could be easily modified to further reward
the functional adaptability of housing. The
introduction of clear standards for a higher
functional adaptability BREEAM score could
substantially boost flexible design in the UK.
HAVE YOUR SAY
To comment on this article:
Eemail Verulam at tse@istructe.org
Etweet @IStructE #TheStructuralEngineer
WATCH ONLINE
You can also watch James’ Pai Lin
Li Travel Award lecture at
https://youtu.be/bf2l7BDJA2c.
ft.com/content/00df659e-1dcf-11e7-a454-
ab04428977f9 (Accessed: April 2018)
E 16) Minami K. (2007) ‘A post-occupancy
evaluation of layout changes made to KEP
adaptable housing’, J. Asian Archit. Build. Eng.,
6 (2), pp. 245–250
E 17) Schmidt R., Eguchi T. and Austin S. (2010)
‘Lessons from Japan: a look at Century Housing
System’, 12th International Dependency and
Structure Modelling Conference, Cambridge,
UK, 22–23 July
E 18) Osaka Gas Company (s.d.) NEXT21 Visitor
Brochure and guided tour
E 19) Minami K. (2016) ‘The efforts to develop
longer life housing with adaptability in Japan’,
Energy Procedia, 96, pp. 662–673
E 20) Din M.I., Bahri N., Dzulkifly M.A. et al.
(s.d.) The adoption of Industrialised Building
System (IBS) construction in Malaysia: The
history, policies, experiences and lesson
learned [Online] Available at: www.iaarc.
org/publications/fulltext/The_adoption_
of_Industrialised_Building_System_(IBS)_
construction_in_Malaysia_The_history,_
policies,_experiences_and_lesson_learned.pdf
(Accessed: October 2018)
E 21) Yusri A. (2017) Move to increase the
uptake of IBS [Online] Available at: www.
focusmalaysia.my/Snippets/move-to-increase-
the-uptake-of-ibs (Accessed: September 2017)
E 22) CIDB Malaysia (2010) CIS 19:2010
Standard Industri Pembinaan [Construction
Industry Standard]
17
02/05/2019 12:03
 Professional guidance
Business Practice Note | No. 24
Business Practice Notes
No. 24: How to prepare a robust
specification and reduce risks
– especially when re-using a
previous specification
Steve Williams provides guidance on preparing a robust specification and explains why
over-reliance on specifications from previous designs imports risks to projects. Steve
discusses how to reduce or eliminate those risks, to improve quality, efficiency and safety.
Introduction
Specifications are one of the
fundamental documents needed
to drive the adequate design and
execution of structures in the built
environment. However, there is a
growing tendency for specifiers
to blindly re-use specifications
prepared for previous projects
without review and without
considering the negative effects of
such practice.
Last month’s Business
Practice Note1 set the scene for
specification writing. This month,
we examine the risks that can
result from such careless practice
and offer solutions to eliminate or
reduce those risks.
What can go wrong?
Given the importance of a
specification, it is disconcerting
to find that its production is
often a last-minute activity, is not
undertaken robustly and may be
based on documents produced
for previous projects without
proper review. This is due to a
variety of reasons – such as lack of
competence, lack of appreciation
of project complexity, or pressure
on costs and time – and may lead
to several risks:
 The specification might not
adequately deal with the
18
TSE87_18-20_Business Practice Notesv2.indd 18
specifics of the project in hand,
might refer to inappropriate
materials and workmanship
unrelated to the project and
might obscure/contradict other
project-specific requirements
that are applicable.
 The specification might refer
to superseded standards,
legislation and guidance, leading
to compliance and legal issues.
 The specification might refer to
products or materials which are
no longer available, or which no
longer comply with standards
and legislation, leading to their
use on a project in error.
 Bad practice may be
perpetuated, progressively
affecting quality issues and
possibly safety issues on site.
 There may be potentially
problematic ‘preamble clauses’
which conflict with the
conditions of contract or are not
applicable to the project in hand.
 The specification might not
adequately cover aspects of
the design which are essential
to convey it to a contractor.
Such issues may lead to
conflict between contractor
and designer, in turn leading to
dispute.
 Poorly defined performance
specifications can be subject
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
to wide interpretation, leading
to imported risk. Conversely, an
over-prescriptive specification
might limit competition and
attract liability to the specifier
if specified items are difficult to
obtain (e.g. obscure products on
long lead times) or perform (e.g.
abnormal tolerances).
 In all but very small projects,
reliance on notes on drawings
with the wrong (or no)
specification often leads to
ambiguity, lack of clarity and
dispute.
 A poor specification will
not give the opportunity for
adequate inspection and test
plans to be produced, leading
to unacceptable quality during
execution, precluding meaningful
independent scrutiny and leading
to the adoption of inappropriate
alternatives.
 A specification written for a
straightforward project might
be used for a novel or complex
project without considering
the complexities involved. For
instance, a simple specification
might not accommodate
sufficient detail on undertaking
complex site welding activities,
where suitable environmental
conditions must exist and
non-destructive testing will be
thestructuralengineer.org
The Business
Practice Note series
has been developed
by the Institution’s
Business Practice
and Regulatory
Control Committee to
provide guidance on
aspects of running a
practice and project
management.
needed to assure weld quality.
In summary, the re-use of
old specifications without
comprehensive review can lead
to a progressively worsening
situation where clauses may no
longer comply with the technical
regulations and standards applied,
so are inappropriate to the project
in hand. This creates ambiguity,
reduces quality and increases
the risk of delay, additional costs,
disputes and adverse safety issues.
Getting it right: a guide
to preparing a robust
specification that reduces
these risks
Allow time
Every project should be afforded
the time to create and check a
robustly worded specification
to account for that project.
This may be based on previous
work, provided that a review is
undertaken to ensure nothing
has been superseded and
that everything is relevant and
appropriate.
Nonetheless, particular care
should be taken when basing a
new specification upon an old one.
The new project may incorporate
factors that the old specification
did not need to include, so new
02/05/2019 10:48
 Professional guidance
thestructuralengineer.org No. 24 | Business Practice Note

clauses may need to be inserted to interfaces. specifications can be helpful in specifications usually require a
cater for these new factors. fulfilling this need. contractor’s design input. It is
Develop the specification When dealing with essential that the combination of
Use standard specifications alongside the design refurbishments, there may be a specification types is appropriate
The use of standard specifications The specification should be need to refer to specifications in to the conditions of contract, to
(see Note No. 231) can developed at the same time as any existing health and safety files avoid conflict and confusion.
help incorporate the latest the design progresses. Early when writing new specifications, to
comprehensive thinking on consideration given to appropriate ensure interfaces between old and Use consistent language
materials and workmanship. They specification at the concept and new are adequately managed. Always use the same word to
will normally include clauses that optioneering stages, e.g. the describe the same thing in a
cover most situations, and which decision to galvanise rather than Avoid repetition specification. For example, don’t
can be included or excluded from paint steel, can then be developed Care should be taken to ensure use the words ‘rebar’, ‘steel
the bespoke project-specific into detailed specification repetition is avoided. Define reinforcement’ and ‘reinforcement
section that usually introduces the clauses as the detailed design is everything only once, or differing bar’ to describe the same thing.
standard specification. progressed. In this way, adequate definitions can result in confusion, Pick one of these names and use it
Care should be taken to ensure attention is paid to the specification claims and extra costs. consistently.
that the current versions of at all times, rather than it being The consistent use of tenses
standard specifications are used. rushed as a last-minute activity. Be mindful of scale is another factor to bear in mind
It is worth checking that they have This has the added advantage The specifier should consider the when writing a specification. For
been maintained properly to remain that costings can be refined appropriateness of a specification example, the NBS uses imperative
up to date with legislation and as detailed design progresses, to the scale of a project and to language (e.g. ‘FIX this’. ‘DO
standards to avoid confusion and without being based on gross its complexity. For instance, a full that’) whereas more traditional
dispute. assumptions, leading to better cost NBS-based specification might specifications use the third person
certainty. Where possible, early be considered excessive for a future tense (e.g. ‘This SHALL be
Review third-party specifications contractor involvement is useful to small domestic extension, where fixed as follows…’). It is always
There is a risk that specifiers help shape a robust and practical specification items on the drawings best to be consistent in this
will rely on third parties keeping specification. may be more appropriate. respect, noting also that imperative
their specifications up to date, Also, a large, detailed and language usually reduces the
which may not be the case. Take care with refurbishments unedited specification may result number of words required to make
Careful review will help to ensure Specialist advice should be sought in a higher price for a project, e.g. a point.
that changes are made where to write appropriate specification because:
necessary. clauses when dealing with  a tendering contractor might not Use a clear layout
In addition, it may be necessary refurbishment and repairs to old have time to account for it and Apply a modular format in the
to ensure that there are no buildings and structures. Existing might therefore load their price drafting of the specification
conflicts between specifiers materials, such as wrought and to accommodate perceived risk document to make it user friendly
of various disciplines, such as cast iron, as well as structural  important specification items so that it can be readily applied
ensuring compatibility between the forms, such as jack arch floors, might be lost in a sea of on site.
architects’, engineers’ and MEP often do not comply with modern unnecessary clauses and hence
specifications where there are standards. Client standard ignored. Coordinate with other contract
constraints
Incorporate lessons learnt and Specifications need to be written
KEY POINTS
good practice to comply with legislation, such
The development of a robust as competition laws and the EU
 Direct re-use of specifications without detailed review should not be
undertaken due to the risks such use imports to projects. specification should account for Construction Products Regulation
 A specifier who does consider re-use of a specification on another lessons learnt and good practice (CPR). This will lead to the
similar project must ensure the document is carefully reviewed and from previous projects. For incorporation of appropriately
updated. instance, consultant, contractor assured, compliant materials into
 Robust specifications are key precursors to drive adequate
construction quality, safety and longevity. They will reduce conflict and
and client organisations can the works.
dispute, leading to better collaboration and business efficiency. independently and jointly identify Designers must ensure that
 Allow time to produce the specification as the design progresses. areas of common concern, e.g. the drawings and other project
Check and review the specification and consider third-party review to incorrect specification of materials documents are compatible with
provide added robustness.
leading to bimetallic corrosion the specification, also ensuring
 Use standard specifications where they are appropriate. Always
review third-party specifications unless there is certainty that they are issues, which would help to ensure that ‘standard notes’ and ‘specific
carefully and regularly maintained. specifications are robust. notes’ on drawings are up to date
 Take care with refurbishments. and do not attempt to repeat or
 Incorporate lessons learnt and good practice so that your Don’t conflict with the building reinterpret specification clauses.
specifications develop and improve.
 Avoid repetition, use consistent language and a clear layout, and
contract A carefully worded specification
coordinate with other contract constraints. Don’t conflict with the Great care is required when a will allow proper development and
building contract. Be mindful of scale as an unnecessarily large combination of performance and approval of inspection and test
specification could result in an overpriced project. prescriptive specification types is plans. The intrinsic link between
 Promote the specification to make sure that those who need to read it
used, as some forms of contract appropriate inspection and test
have done so, such that all the hard work that went into it is not wasted
during execution of the works. do not incorporate any provision plans being based on a robust
for contractor design. Performance specification will help to ensure

TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 19

TSE87_18-20_Business Practice Notesv2.indd 19 02/05/2019 10:48

 Professional guidance
Business Practice Note | No. 24 thestructuralengineer.org

adequate quality control during
execution.
Check and review
Allocate resources for robust
checking of the specification in
conjunction with the drawings
to ensure that there are no
ambiguities which could lead to
disputes.
Specifiers can refer to a quality
management system that requires
specifications to be reviewed
and feedback made, as part of
an overall project review process.
This could include processes for
the production and checking of
the specification. In cases where
novel or complex engineering is
involved, third-party independent
review might also be necessary
to ensure the specification is
robust. Such checks will ensure the
specifications are both executable
and practicable.
If you don’t hit the deadline…
Where timescales dictate that
specifications cannot be fully
completed to meet programme
timescales, it is vital that missing
specification items are not
overlooked, by employing a
‘controlling mind’ to oversee
the robust development of
specifications as the design
develops.
Promote your specification
Finally, as noted last month, it is
important to put measures into
place so that those who need
to read and understand the
specification are clear on their
importance. Possible strategies
include making a special point at a
precontract meeting, or contacting
the contractor before work starts
and drawing their attention to the
relevant documents.
If a project is very small,
specification clauses can
sometimes be included exclusively
on the drawings, which some
consider to be a more reliable
way of communicating to those
executing the design on site.
Conclusion
The blind re-use of previous
specifications without careful
review can potentially import
significant risks into the built
environment, in terms of quality,
longevity, efficiency and safety.
By ensuring adequate time and
resource is committed to the
production of project-specific,
up-to-date specifications of
workmanship and materials, these
risks can be controlled, leading
to better quality structures and
to increased safety, reliability,
longevity and business efficiency.
This note has been prepared
by Steve Williams BEng (Hons),
CEng, MIStructE, MICE, AMAPM
on behalf of the Institution of
Structural Engineers’ Business
Practice and Regulatory Control
Committee.
Members are reminded that they
should always comply with the
legislation of the region in which
they are working and should be
aware of any jurisdictions specific
to that region.
Business Practice Notes are
provided as guidance to members,
but do not form part of the
Regulations and/or Laws of the
Institution. All members are obliged
to abide by the Institution’s Code of
Conduct.
REFERENCE
E1) Williams S. (2019)
‘Business Practice Note
No. 23: An introduction to
specifications’, The Structural
Engineer, 97 (4), pp. 24–25
HAVE YOUR SAY
To comment on this article:
Eemail Verulam at
tse@istructe.org
Etweet @IStructE
#TheStructuralEngineer

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p21_TSE.May19.indd 21 30/04/2019 14:59

 Professional guidance
CROSS newsletter
Confidential Reporting on Structural
Safety (CROSS): newsletter 54
In this article, we highlight
a report from CROSS
ISTRUCTE
newsletter 54, on temporary
stability in a steel-framed
building.
789: Temporary stability of steel-
framed building
Report
This event concerns the temporary stability
of a four-storey steel-framed structure with
precast concrete planks and a structural
topping. A reporter says that during the
erection of the structure, the contractor
had provided temporary steel bracing to a
number of the bays to stabilise the structure
and prevent it from swaying. The bracing
was in the form of flat steel plates arranged
diagonally.
While attending site, the visiting structural
engineer found one of the bracing members
unbolted at the base of a column. The column
which the bracing should have been fixed to
was located at the perimeter of the building
where the outside ground level was lower than
the internal slab level. To protect operatives
from falls, edge protection had been provided.
But when installing the edge protection, the
bracing had been unbolted.
The situation was plainly unsafe and
indicated both a disregard for safety by the
operative who unbolted the bracing and a lack
of control, supervision and oversight from the
main contractor.
For the same project, several concerns
were found about the temporary works design
for the temporary stability of the frame:
1) During the project, the engineer had
communicated that until the concrete planks
were grouted together, the diaphragm for
distributing the lateral loads should be
assumed to be incomplete. The implication of
this was that the stability of the structure was
the responsibility of the contractor until the
diaphragm was complete.
The steel frame subcontractor was
responsible for both the erection of the steel
22
TSE87_22-23_CROSS newsletter.indd 22
thestructuralengineer.org
based on the moment capacity of the end-
plate connections and, while this principle
was sensible, there were no accompanying
calculations. The structural engineer deemed
this was insufficient to demonstrate that the
frame would be stable during construction.
There are, says the reporter, two lessons
learned from the above experiences. The
first is that temporary works designers for
main contractors may not have adequate
 Bracing may be required to provide
stability in temporary, as well as
permanent, condition
experience to undertake the temporary works
design for the stability of a steel frame. Given
the size of the structure, the lack of calculation
frame and the landing of the precast concrete initially provided by the steel subcontractor
planks. While they were willing to take on was also of concern and may be indicative
design responsibility for the temporary of a more widespread problem within the
stability of the steel frame without planks, industry.
they passed on design responsibility for the The second lesson is that splitting design
steel frame when the precast planks had responsibility for temporary works inevitability
been landed to the main contractor. provides opportunity for confusion, but
This division of responsibility was thankfully did not endanger safety in this case.
unexpected and led to confusion between
the two temporary works designers, with CROSS Panel comments
the steel frame subcontractor using moment Structural-Safety has always advocated that
fixity from the beam end-plate connections there should always be one designer with
and the main contractor assuming perfectly overall responsibility for stability. While this
pinned beam–column connections that normally applies to preserving stability of the
required cross-bracing. The latter approach finished structure, the principle ought equally
eventually proved to be very conservative and to apply during construction when arguably
had to be revised to be cost-effective. the risk of an instability failure is highest.
2) When the main contractor began the Regulation 13 of CDM 2015 ultimately
temporary stability design for the steel frame places the duty on the Principal Contractor
with concrete planks, they requested to see to plan, manage and monitor the construction
the calculations that had been completed phase and coordinate matters relating to
by the steel frame subcontractor for the health and safety during the construction
frame without planks. Stability was justified phase to ensure that, so far as is reasonably
REFERENCES
E1) Structural Safety (2017) SCOSS Alert: Inquiry into the construction of Edinburgh Schools
[Online] Available at: www.structural-safety.org/media/397456/scoss-alert-inquiry-into-the-
construction-of-edinburgh-schools-final-20-february-.pdf (Accessed: April 2019)
E2) Hackitt J. (2018) Building a Safer Future: Independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire
Safety: final report [Online] Available at: www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-
review-of-building-regulations-and-fire-safety-final-report (Accessed: April 2019)
E3) British Standards Institution (2008) BS 5975:2008+A1:2011 Code of practice for temporary
works procedures and the permissible stress design of falsework, London: BSI
E4) British Standards Institution (2017) PAS 8811:2017 Temporary works. Major infrastructure
client procedures. Code of practice, London: BSI
E5) Temporary Works Forum website (2019) [Online] Available at: www.twforum.org.uk/home
(Accessed: April 2019)
E6) British Constructional Steel Association (2006) Publication 42/06: Guide to the Erection of
Multi-Storey Buildings, London: BCSA
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
02/05/2019 10:53
 Professional guidance
thestructuralengineer.org CROSS newsletter

practicable, construction work is carried out WHAT IS CROSS?

without risks to health or safety. In all situations,
the Principal Contractor’s Temporary Works
Coordinator (TWC) (or Contractor’s if a small job)
should have oversight of maintaining stability.
However, the designer should be involved in a
collaborative manner to ensure stability at all
times.
This report also highlights the potential value
of visits by the design team who may (as on this
occasion) identify a problem. A current trend
to minimise site attendance by the design team
is most undesirable; a matter that was brought
up in the Edinburgh Schools Inquiry1 and the
Independent Review of Building Regulations and
Fire Safety: final report2.
Reference should also be made to BS 59753
and PAS 88114, as well as the Temporary Works
Forum website5, for guidance on the management
of structures in temporary conditions.
Specific to steel-framed buildings, the BCSA
Guide to the Erection of Multi-Storey Buildings6
provides advice on maintaining stability during
construction.
Confidential Reporting on Structural Safety (CROSS) is a confidential reporting scheme
established to capture and share lessons learned from structural safety issues which
might not otherwise have had public recognition, with the aim of preventing future
failures.
Analysis of the reported safety issues can provide insight into how the safety
concerns or events occurred and spur the development of measures to improve safety.
WHAT SHOULD BE REPORTED TO CROSS?
Structural failures and collapses, or safety concerns about the design, construction
or use of structures should be reported. Near misses, or observations relating to
failures or collapses (which have not been uncovered through formal investigation) are
also welcomed. Reports do not have to be about current activities as long as they are
relevant.
Small-scale events are important – they can be the precursors to more major failures.
No concern is too small to be reported and conversely nothing is too large.
Your report might relate to a specific experience, or it could be based on a series of
experiences indicating a trend which may require industry or regulatory action.
Submit a report to CROSS at www.structural-safety.org/confidential-reporting/
submit-report/.
RECEIVE THE NEWSLETTER

Readers can register to receive the CROSS newsletters at www.structural-safety.org/

Read the newsletter in full at bit.ly/CROSS_ subscribe.
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TSE87_22-23_CROSS newsletter.indd 23 02/05/2019 10:56

 Professional guidance
Online CM Exam preparation course
Introducing the online Chartered Membership
Examination preparation course
The Institution’s Professional
Development Manager, Peter
Washer, introduces a new
online initiative to prepare
members for the CM Exam.
The Institution is pleased to announce the
development of an online preparation course
for the Chartered Membership Examination, to
be launched ahead of the July sitting.
The Institution’s reputation of high
standing has long been established based
on its professional routes to membership.
Accreditation of competence remains at
the heart of the Institution’s membership
philosophy and at the heart of its charitable
objective of public benefit through public
safety.
While it is essential that we maintain the
rigour and high standards of the profession,
we also recognise the need to provide more,
and improved, support to the individual
members who aspire to professional
membership. One recent example of this is the
launch of a monthly email highlighting available
resources for Initial Professional Development
(IPD), focusing on one core area per month.
The development of the online CM Exam
preparation course marks another significant
development in offering additional, high-quality
support globally.
Why is the course needed?
Institution statistics show that preparation,
and in particular attendance at a course, is a
key factor in pass rates for the CM Exam. To
put it simply, in general, those candidates who
attend a preparation course perform better in
the Exam. Many candidates attend Institution
preparation courses and, in some Regional
Groups, pass rates often exceed 50%.
We encourage candidates to continue to
access courses at HQ or through their local
Regional Group, details of which may be found
on the Institution website (www.istructe.org/
membership/examination/exam-preparation-
courses).
The online preparation course offers
additional support to all candidates, but
especially to those who do not have access
24
TSE87_24_Exam course.indd 24
 The new online
course will help
candidates prepare
for the CM Exam
wherever they are
in the world
to a course at HQ or through their Regional
Group.
Benefits of the course
The online course provides the ultimate in
flexibility and accessibility. Candidates will be
able to access the material anywhere in the
world at a time that suits them. The course is
divided into modules that mirror the sections
of the CM Exam and allows candidates
to progress through their preparation in a
structured manner over several weeks or
months. The modules include:
 Purpose of the Exam and its structure
 Conceptual design – Section 1A
 Communication with the client – Section 1B
 Structural design of all principal elements –
Section 2C
 Structural drawings – Section 2D
 Construction issues – Section 2E
 Recent developments in the Exam and
additional resources.
The course will feature videos, PowerPoint
presentations and animated time-lapse
drawings delivered by chartered structural
engineers. There will be opportunities for
reflection, review of previous questions and
time for you to liaise with peers and mentors to
better develop your conceptual design abilities
and exam technique. The course will also set
levels of expectation by critiquing sample
scripts from candidates who have passed and
failed the Exam.
The Institution understands the
importance of preparation for the CM
Exam and recognises the significant effort
that candidates and their mentors put into
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
thestructuralengineer.org
preparing for it. We are committed to ensuring
that all candidates are fully supported and have
the best possible chance of passing.
In 2017, 51% of first-time candidates passed
the CM Exam and we want to continue, and
develop, this trend. The online course provides
additional support to complement the existing
face-to-face provision and wealth of resources
on the Institution’s website.
We recognise that there are a range of
support materials available, some of which
are provided by individuals and outside
organisations with have little or no involvement
in the CM Exam. The online course ensures
candidates have access to the latest, accurate
and trustworthy guidance from Institution
experts.
Further online CPD to come
The new online preparation course is a
milestone for the Institution, not only in offering
high-quality, reliable CM Exam preparation
material for every candidate around the world,
but also in the Institution’s plans towards
provision of a portfolio of online courses that,
in time, will match our suite of face-to-face
Continuing Professional Development (CPD)
courses in both range and quality of subjects
on offer. As with our face-to-face courses, the
online courses will be developed by leading
subject experts and delivered in line with best
practice in learning and teaching.
Register your interest
Further information will be made available over
the next few months, but to register an interest
in taking the CM Exam preparation course,
please contact training@istructe.org.
02/05/2019 10:57
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 Technical
Technical Guidance Note | Level 2, No. 21 thestructuralengineer.org

Technical Guidance Notes

Level 2, No. 21: Design and detailing of
base plates to steel columns
Chris O’Regan Technical Guidance Notes are published by The Institution of
BEng(Hons), CEng, FIStructE, FICE Structural Engineers to provide guidance to engineers in the early
stages of their careers. This note has been prepared by AECOM on
Associate Director, Building Engineering, AECOM, London, UK behalf of the Institution.

Introduction ICON LEGEND

The primary means by which steel-framed structures transmit vertical loads into
their foundations is via base plates. A base plate spreads the load from a column
W Design principles
into the foundation. This Technical Guidance Note describes the design and
detailing of such plates.
The note only covers simple connection base plates, i.e. those that do not W Applied practice

transmit a bending moment. Two types of action are applied to such plates:
compressive axial forces; and, in some cases, shear forces due to lateral forces W Worked example
within braced bays.
W Further reading

W Resources
Design principles

Definition
This Technical Guidance Note concerns the
design and detailing of steel base plates to
steel columns that are typically found within
building structures. The note only concerns
base plates that principally transmit vertical
forces into the foundations of a structure.
The design and detailing guidance
presented is based on BS EN 1993-1-8.
Readers working to other codes of practice
will nevertheless gain an understanding of
good practice with respect to steel base plate
design, as well as the underlying principles of
how such plates function.
Detailing guidance
The components of a base plate are set out
in Figure 1. Each component must be detailed
in such a way as to ensure that the base plate
successfully transmits the vertical action it
supports into the foundations as safely and
efficiently as possible. To ensure that this is
achieved, a number of guidelines need to be
followed.
First, the tolerances of concrete
foundations and steel frames are not
compatible. The margin of error with respect
to the location of footings is greater than for
steelwork and this requires the installation
of shims and/or self-levelling grout to base
plates in order to fill the void between the
plate and the foundation it sits on. Packing
pieces are installed to level the column and
holding down bolts are used to locate the
column and its base plate.
Second, it is important to acknowledge the
temporary condition of the column and the
base plate – both during erection and once
left in place during construction. A base plate
that is essentially a pinned connection has
a nominal moment capacity which prevents
it from toppling over once the column is in
place. However, the performance of the base
plate is limited when resisting such forces;
therefore, temporary bracing typically plays a
key role during the erection of steel frames.
Additionally, holding down bolts sit within
a cast-in cone that is only grouted up once
the column is in position and the steel frame
is complete. Where bolts are cast in, a large
washer plate is used to provide anchorage for
the bolt during erection of the steel frame.
In some instances, holding down bolts are
post-fixed into the concrete foundation, but
this is relatively uncommon other than for
smaller posts within low-rise structures.
Third, the baseplate must be able to resist
a nominal bending moment in its temporary
state in order to prevent it from toppling over
during erection of the steel frame. This is
typically achieved by installing four holding
down bolts into the baseplate.
Pinned bases are detailed in such a way as
to be sufficiently flexible to allow a nominal
bending resistance within the assembly,
without this being significant enough to
transmit the rotation into the foundations. It
can therefore be ignored for the purposes of
the substructure design.
Holding down bolts are typically of property
class Grade 8.8 (and no stronger than this).
They have an embedment depth of 16–18
times the bolt diameter. When cast into the
foundations, they are placed into a cone
with a diameter of 75mm. Larger base plates

26 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

TSE87_26-29_Technical Guidance Notesv4.indd 26 02/05/2019 10:58


thestructuralengineer.org
include a grout hole to allow for placement of
the self-compacting and levelling material.
The initial sizing of the base plate should
be based on it being 100mm wider and longer
than the column it is attached to, while the
thickness should not be less than that of the
flange or wall thickness (for hollow sections)
of the column. Additionally, the minimum edge
distance to the holding down bolts needs to
be considered; this can often result in the
100mm dimension described above being
exceeded.
Design guidance
Pinned base plates typically have to support
axial actions; however, there are instances
where they must also resist shear forces.
Such actions are typically resisted by the
friction between the base plate and the
foundation it is fixed to.
BS EN 1993-1-8 describes the design
method for pinned base plates in cls. 6.2.5
and 6.2.8.2(1). The principle behind the design
of base plates is that the applied stress
due to vertical actions does not exceed the
design bearing strength of the foundation,
which is typically concrete. These clauses
describe how the applied stresses are
modelled using an equivalent area known
as ‘Equivalent T-stub in compression’. This
models the whole section of the steel column,
which exerts a stress over a defined area
based on the geometric properties of the
steel section (Figure 2).
The variables identified in Fig. 2 are defined
in the following equations and the reader is
recommended to refer to this diagram when
reviewing them.
The design compression resistance of a
T-stub is described in cl. 6.2.5(3) of BS EN
1993-1-8, reproduced here as Equation 1.
FC,Rd = f jd Aeff (1)
where:
FC,Rd is the design compression resistance of
a T-stub
fjd is the design bearing strength of the base
plate, which is based on the concrete bearing
strength of the foundation the base plate is
installed onto, as defined in Equation 2
Aeff is the effective area of the base plate
assumed to be under uniform bearing
pressure.
As a starting point when designing a base
plate, it should be assumed that the applied
action is spread across the base plate as
described in Fig. 2. This should be compared
TSE87_26-29_Technical Guidance Notesv4.indd 27
 Figure 1
Components of typical base
plate to steel column
with what is required in terms of bearing area.
The design bearing stress is calculated using
Eq. 2.
f jd = β jα f cd
where:
β j is the characteristic strength of the grout
that is placed under the base plate multiplied
by a factor of 0.67. This is provided the
characteristic strength of the grout is not less
than 20% of that of the concrete that forms
the substructure
α is the coefficient of diffusion of the vertical
action that is being applied to the foundation.
Conservatively, this can be taken to be 1.5,
although this can be increased based on the
geometry of the substructure as defined in cl.
6.7 of BS EN 1992-1-1
fcd is the compressive strength of the
concrete the base plate is fixed to. This is
calculated using Equation 3.
f ck
f cd = α cc
γc
where:
α cc is the coefficient that allows for long-
term effects on the compressive strength of
concrete versus applied actions, as defined in
cl. 3.1.6 of BS EN 1992-1-1, which is taken to be
0.85 in the UK National Annex
fck is the cylinder strength of the concrete the
foundation is formed from
γ c is the material factor for concrete, which is
taken to be 1.5 in the UK National Annex.
The magnitude of Aeff is dependent on
the manner in which actions are applied to
the column the base plate is fixed to. When
actions are applied concentrically, the whole
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019
Technical
Technical Guidance Note | Level 2, No. 21
column cross-section applies the vertical
action onto the base plate. Therefore, it
follows that Aeff is as per Equations 8 or 10,
provided the base plate is large enough to
(2) accommodate variable ‘c’ (defined later in this
note) in all directions.
Taking this further, beff is calculated using
Equation 4, while leff is calculated using
Equation 5, both of which rely on variable ‘c’.
beff = 2c + tf (4)
leff = 2c + b (5)
Variable ‘c’ is calculated using the guidance
given in cl. 6.2.5(4) of BS EN 1993-1-8. The
guidance assumes that the compressive
stress is spread evenly underneath each
component of the steel column, i.e. its web
and flanges. The magnitude of the design
bearing strength is given in cl. 6.2.5(7) and is
reproduced here as Equation 6 when a T-stub
compression area applies.
(3)
β j FRdu
f jd = (6)
beff leff
where:
FRdu is the design resistance force of the
concrete foundations in accordance with BS
EN 1992-1-1, cl. 6.7(2) and is based on the
effective area Aeff. Note that this strength
can be up to three times that of the design
compressive cylinder strength of the
concrete.
The location of the steel column relative
to the edges of the base plate has an impact
on its design. In cl. 6.2.5(6) of BS EN 1993-
1-8, the dimension ‘c’ is defined in terms of
‘short’ and ‘large’ projections of base plates
27
02/05/2019 10:58
 Technical
Technical Guidance Note | Level 2, No. 21 thestructuralengineer.org

E
Figure 2
Applied compression area of
open-section steel column for
large-projection base plate

from the perimeter of the open-section steel

column. Where a projection of the base plate
is less than ‘c’, it is considered to be a ‘short’
projection, while those that are greater are
considered to be ‘large’. The dimension ‘c’
can be determined using Equation 7, which
reflects what is described in cl. 6.2.5(4).
0.5
⎡ fy ⎤ (7)
c = tp ⎢ ⎥
⎢⎣ 3 f jdγ M 0 ⎥⎦
where:
c is the assumed cantilever around the
perimeter of the column
tp is the thickness of the T-stub flange, which
is the baseplate thickness and may need to
be assumed to start with
fy is the yield strength of the T-stub flange
γ M0 is the partial factor for cross-sectional
resistance of steel elements, which is 1.00 for
buildings according to the UK National Annex
to BS EN 1993-1-1.
tw is the thickness of the web of the steel column
Once the value of ‘c’ has been calculated, tf is the thickness of the flange of the steel column
b is the width of the steel column
the type of projection to the base plate can c is the width over which the applied axial stress is assumed to spread within the base plate
be categorised and the appropriate equation
used to determine the size of the T-stub.
Eq. 7 can then be rearranged so that Aeff The thickness of the base plate is based be satisfied in order to demonstrate that the
can be determined: on the assumption that there is bending base plate can resist the applied shear based
stress caused by the bearing pressure under on the frictional resistance of the base plate-
Aeff = 4c 2 + cPcol + Acol (8) the column and the cantilever within the to-foundation interface.
plate. The magnitude of this bending stress
where: assumes that the bearing pressure acting Fv ,Rd ≤ Ff ,Rd (12)
Aeff is the effective area between the base plate and the concrete
Pcol is the perimeter of the column section foundation is the same as that calculated in where:
Acol is the cross-sectional area of the column. Eq. 6, i.e. fjd. With this being the case, Equation Ff,Rd is the design friction resistance of the
11 can be applied to calculate the required base plate and is a function of Cf,d and Nc,Ed
Eq. 8 assumes that there is no overlap thickness of the base plate, tp. (Note that Cf,d is the coefficient of friction between the
within the T-stub areas. To check that this is Eq. 7 may then need to be revisited if tp was grout and the base plate, which is typically 0.2
the case, the width of the flange T-stub has to assumed at the time.) for all forms of grout
be less than half the depth between flanges. Nc,Ed is the ultimate axial compressive force
This can be checked using Equation 9. 3 f jdγ M 0 (11) that is applied to the base plate.
tp ≥ c ×
f yp
h − 2tf
c≤ (9) If shear forces are too high to resist
2 where: through friction, a shear key may need to
where: tp is the design thickness of the base plate be used to transfer the shear force through
h is the depth of the open-section element in fyp is the design strength of the base plate bearing into the concrete.
the major axis fjd is the design bearing strength of the
tf is the thickness of the flange. concrete the base plate is resting on and is
calculated using Eq. 2
When there is overlap within the T-stub γ M0 is the partial factor for cross-sectional Applied practice
areas, the effective area needs to be resistance of steel elements.
recalculated using Eq. 10.
Any applied shear is primarily resisted BS EN 1992-1-1:2004+A1:2014 Eurocode 2:
Aeff = ( h + 2c ) ( b + 2c )
(10) by friction between the baseplate and the Design of concrete structures. General rules
= 4c + 2 ( h + b ) c + hb
2
foundation. Cl. 6.2.2(6) of BS EN 1993-1-8 and rules for buildings
where: verifies this by comparing the applied shear
b is the width of the open-section column in to the design shear resistance (Fv,Rd) of the NA+A2:14 to BS EN 1992-1-1:2004+A1:2014
the minor axis. base plate connection. Equation 12 needs to UK National Annex to Eurocode 2: Design of

28 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

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 Technical
thestructuralengineer.org Technical Guidance Note | Level 2, No. 21

Worked example Glossary and further reading

A 254 × 254 × 107 universal column (UC) supports an ultimate axial action of 2400kN Glossary
and a shear action of 25kN. The base plate sits on a foundation of Grade C40/50 Grout – self-compacting cementitious
concrete that forms a 1.5m deep pile cap. Design the base plate assuming a Grade S275 material placed directly underneath a base
mild steel is to be used. plate.

Holding down bolt – a bolt that is cast into

the foundations and fixes the base plate to
the substructure.

T-stub – an area of applied stress within

a base plate that is directly beneath a
component of an open-section steel column.

Further reading
Davison B. and Owens J.W. (eds.)
(2012) Steel Designers’ Manual (7th ed.),
Chichester: Wiley

Jaspart J.P., Demonceau J.F., Renkin S.

and Guillaume M.L. (2009) European
Recommendations for the Design of
Simple Joints in Steel Structures, Brussels:
European Convention for Constructional
Steelwork

Steel Construction Institute and British

Constructional Steelwork Association (2014)
P358: Joints in Steel Construction: Simple
Joints to Eurocode 3, Ascot and London: SCI
and BCSA

Resources

Steel Construction Institute:

http://steel-sci.com/

Steel Construction Info:

concrete structures. General rules and http://SteelConstruction.info
rules for buildings
British Constructional Steelwork Association:
NA+A1:2014 to BS EN 1993-1-1:2005+A1:14 www.steelconstruction.org/bcsa/
AECOM is built to deliver a better
UK National Annex to Eurocode 3: Design of
world. We design, build, finance
steel structures. General rules and rules for European Convention for Constructional
and operate infrastructure assets
buildings Steelwork
for governments, businesses and
www.steelconstruct.com/
organisations in more than 150
BS EN 1993-1-8:2005 Eurocode 3: Design of
countries. As a fully integrated
steel structures. Design of joints
firm, we connect knowledge and
experience across our global network
NA to BS EN 1993-1-8:2005 UK National
of experts to help clients solve their
Annex to Eurocode 3: Design of steel
most complex challenges.
structures. Design of joints

TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 29

TSE87_26-29_Technical Guidance Notesv4.indd 29 02/05/2019 10:59

 Opinion
A performance-based future? thestructuralengineer.org

Which way
Viewpoint now for codes
and standards:
Prescription,
Stuart Matthews looks to the future and considers
the potential benefits – and difficulties – of developing performance-
performance- or outcomes-based codes of practice and
standards for the construction industry. based or what?

Introduction engineering practice

Building regulations and construction and manufacture?
standards have been in the spotlight Now, concepts
recently, particularly as a result of a number such as ‘mass
of fire incidents around the globe, notably customisation’,
in the UAE and the Grenfell Tower fire backed by agile
tragedy in the UK. These events are having bespoke design
an important influence on the development and manufacturing
of building regulations and construction technologies, are
standards. being proposed by
Building control requirements date back some as examples of
to antiquity. King Hammurabi of Babylon1 is a potentially plausible
famously credited with the first recorded future production
building regulation – this is his Law 229 philosophy. How
dating from around 1750BC. Among other applicable will
matters, this defines various liabilities for the these concepts
builder of a house which collapses, with the be to structural
liabilities depending on the consequences of engineering in the
the collapse. future? What might
Law 229 is effectively a performance the implications be
statement. It addressed structural safety if such approaches
and performance in terms of the user became the new
experience, with no mention of the material paradigm for
or form of construction of the building. construction?
However, it is also relevant to note that many
of the other Laws of King Hammurabi – of Drivers of change
which there are nearly 300 – were of a The ever-increasing
prescriptive nature. power of artificial
ALAMY

Today’s British Standards Institution (BSI)
grew out of the standards development
activities of the UK professional engineering
community in the late 19th and early 20th
centuries. The introduction of prescriptive
standards produced clear economic
benefits for the large-scale production
intelligence (AI) and The first recorded building regulation appeared
in King Hammurabi of Babylon's Code of Laws
other sophisticated
software is
expected to result in a much greater
degree of automation of structural design
"AI AND OTHER
and construction functions, especially for
SOPHISTICATED SOFTWARE
IS EXPECTED TO RESULT IN
standard or commonplace building and

A MUCH GREATER DEGREE

of manufactured goods and construction other construction requirements. Maybe

OF AUTOMATION"
materials. some of these services will be provided
However, to what degree is this by ‘apps’ created by companies such as
approach still relevant to current and future Google, Amazon or the like, with their

30 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

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thestructuralengineer.org
ever-growing technological capabilities and
commercial strength. A more positive view is
that the rapid development of AI-driven tools
and digital assistants will free designers to
concentrate on the creative and conceptual
aspects of the engineering requirements.
Another contemporary driver for change
is the pressing challenge of improving
productivity in the construction industry,
which is reported to have effectively been
stagnant for some decades or to have fallen
slightly2 – in a period when productivity in
other industries has grown steadily. Among
other recommendations made is the wider
adoption of factory-based manufacturing
of building components for site assembly,
termed ‘pre-manufacture’ by Farmer2, in order
to reduce the requirement for site labour –
particularly for residential developments.
These developments, along with others not
mentioned here, are likely to have appreciable
implications for the technical content
and presentation of information in design
standards and for the way construction
products/systems are judged to be suitable.
These technological developments would
be expected to foster moves away from
prescriptive rules towards performance- or
outcomes-based requirements. Table 1
itemises some of the benefits and burdens
associated with the performance- or
outcomes-based approach and the traditional
prescriptive approach.
If there are no changes in the way these
matters are addressed, it will become
increasingly difficult to keep pace with
the construction industry’s needs and the
contemporary realities of the expected
increasing rate of change in construction
practices and technologies.
In reviewing the points presented in Table 1,
it is perhaps appropriate to reflect that many
modern standards, including the Eurocodes,
do currently allow performance-based design
or ‘demonstration by other means’, such as
by testing or computational design. However,
it has been suggested that such routes can
be a more difficult way to obtain regulatory
approval, compared with a conventional
prescriptive design.
To successfully implement a performance-
based approach, there needs to be:
 better alignment between the industry’s
interests and those of its clients
 changes in procurement protocols and
contractual and relationship arrangements
within the industry
 provisions for construction products
involving new materials, processes and
techniques.
TSE87_30-32_Viewpoint.indd 31
TABLE 1: SOME BENEFITS AND BURDENS ASSOCIATED WITH PERFORMANCE-BASED
AND TRADITIONAL PRESCRIPTIVE APPROACHES TO STANDARDS
Benefits/advantages
Performance- or outcomes-based approach
 Specifiers can focus on the performance
needed
 Facilitates innovation/development and
adoption of new products and materials
 Allows the most appropriate organisations
in a project supply chain to define/specify/
design suitable solutions
 Allows greater flexibility and, potentially,
sensitivity in the design and specification of
the technical solutions to be adopted for a
building/constructed asset
 Allows the most appropriate organisation to
take responsibility for technical, contractual
and other associated risks
 Allows flexibility in the point at which a
defined/prescriptive solution is ‘crystallised’
 Can potentially improve cost-efficiency
Traditional prescriptive approach
 Prescription provides clarity in the way that
the requirement is to be delivered
 Prescriptive solutions are recognised in law
 For traditional materials and forms of
construction, past experience can be
a reasonable basis for demonstrating
potential performance likely to be
satisfactory
 ‘Standard’ solutions are useful for simpler/
straightforward circumstances
 Following the prescription/‘recipe’ creates
a ‘level playing field’ allowing competition
between producers with disparate levels of
competence
What does the future hold?
Recognising the general direction of travel
of construction industry developments in
the UK and around the world, it is expected
that, technically, the future will be orientated
towards the further development of
performance-based or outcomes-based
standards and codes of practice. This will not
be without its difficulties (see Table 1) and will
require challenging technical developments
to be achieved in the way that standards
and codes of practice are formulated and
supported. Accordingly, this is expected to be
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019
Opinion
A performance-based future?
Potential burdens/disadvantages
 Can be difficult to identify the potentially
wide range of relevant performance
requirements
 Can be difficult to define these in terms of
accurately measurable/verifiable factors
 Can be difficult to verify that defined
performance requirements will be achieved
 Testing is commonly required to show that
performance requirements will be achieved
 To demonstrate potential compliance with
longer-term performance requirements
(e.g. durability), a combination of testing and
performance modelling is typically required
 Places greater reliance on the competence
of those undertaking design and
construction
 Regulators verifying quality/compliance
with requirements need greater rigour and
abilities
 Prescription may not give desired
performance
 Acts as barrier to innovation and uptake of
new products and materials
 Specified prescription may be applied
‘bluntly’ irrespective of actual circumstances
of use or occupancy of building/asset
 Available experience lags behind technical
developments in products and materials
 Can be too much reliance on ‘standard’
solutions
 Prescriptive guidance soon becomes ‘out
of date’
 Does not facilitate competition between
producers with comparable levels of
competence
a lengthy journey.
To achieve success, clients will need to
know how to specify their requirements
and have confidence that these will be met
adequately during the life of the asset they
will have purchased. Industry will need to
know how to respond. Similar issues need
to be addressed with refurbishment and
intervention works. Clarity will be needed
about the forms of contract and relationship
that will be required for the successful
use of performance- or outcomes-based
requirements specification.
31
02/05/2019 11:03
 Opinion
A performance-based future?
ACI Report 329: Performance-based
requirements for concrete3, which presents
a detailed discussion of the differences
between performance and prescriptive
requirements for concrete, has given
consideration to the roles and responsibilities
of the owner and the various parties forming
the construction team in order to successfully
implement a performance-based approach.
The ACI report provides information on
developing performance requirements as
an alternative to the current prescriptive
requirements in the codes and specifications
employed in the USA. It notes that a move
to performance-based requirements for
concrete will allow contractors and concrete
producers to be more innovative and
flexible in the way they take advantage of
developments in concrete materials and
technology to meet client requirements.
Other related developments include the
preparation of the next edition of the fib
Model Code for Concrete Structures (Model
Code 2020)4, which is seeking to adopt,
wherever possible, performance-based
approaches. The vision is that this will be the
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32
TSE87_30-32_Viewpoint.indd 32
"CLIENTS WILL NEED TO
KNOW HOW TO SPECIFY
THEIR REQUIREMENTS AND
HAVE CONFIDENCE THAT
THESE WILL BE MET"
first structural code dealing with both the
design of new structures and the range of
activities associated with the assessment
of, interventions upon and the through-life
management and care of existing concrete
structures.
So, what do you think: prescription or
performance-based or what?
Dr Stuart Matthews
BEng, PhD, CEng, CSci, CWEM, FIStructE, FICE,
MCIWEM
Stuart has been involved in the assessment of
existing structures for many years. Recently he has
been leading the Fédération Internationale du
Béton’s (fib) work on the next edition of its Model
Code for Concrete Structures, MC2020.
*Excludes Student Members and Affiliates
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
thestructuralengineer.org
REFERENCES
E 1) Wikipedia (2019) Code of Hammurabi
[Online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Code_of_Hammurabi (Accessed:
March 2019))
E 2) Farmer M. (2016) The Farmer Review
of the UK Construction Labour Model:
Modernise or die – Time to decide the
industry’s future [Online] Available at: www.
constructionleadershipcouncil.co.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2016/10/Farmer-Review.
pdf (Accessed: March 2019)
E 3) American Concrete Institute (2014)
ACI Report 329: Performance-based
requirements for concrete, Farmington Hills,
MI: ACI
E 4) fib (2013) fib Model Code for Concrete
Structures 2010, Berlin: Ernst & Sohn
HAVE YOUR SAY
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02/05/2019 11:05

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Verulam
Readers’ letters,
comments and queries
Technical
Guidance Note:
lintels
It’s always good to get feedback
on guidance published in The
Structural Engineer. Ed Saul
believes there are some
deficiencies in March’s Technical
Guidance Note on lintels.
I am concerned at the lack of practical
advice given in this series of articles. In
my opinion, the example retaining wall
(October 2018) was overdesigned. The
latest on lintel design (March 2019) has a
number of omissions:
BS 5977-1:1981 Clause 5: Limiting conditions
e) Where there is a single opening spanned
by the lintel, the width of masonry on either
side of the opening is not less than 600mm
or 0.2 times the clear span of the lintel,
whichever is the greater.
If arching is to be relied upon, the
bearing masonry needs to be capable of
supporting the horizontal thrust. This is
particularly important where single-course
composite prestressed lintels are used.
Another restriction with these lintels is that
composite action only works in new build.
Reinforced concrete lintels should be
reinforced top and bottom to avoid the
obvious error of installing them upside-
down. Some manufacturers overcome this
problem by placing the reinforcement at
mid-height. Fortunately, off-the-shelf lintels
are overdesigned for builders who order
lintels by size rather than load capacity.
Some builders will omit small lintels and
rely on ‘structural door and window frames’.
One problem for engineers to avoid is that
the load capacity is usually stated as total
TSE87_33-35_Verulam.indd 33
load rather than load per metre.
In my experience, the most frequent
failure in external lintels is poor cavity
drainage. Some steel lintels have built in
cavity trays, but weep holes and end stops
are often forgotten.
You might have thought it would be hard
to write much on what must be one of
the simplest of structural elements.
However, the Technical Guidance
Note, together with these comments,
suggests otherwise. As always, there
are complications. Strictly speaking, the
BS 5977 clause relates to the wall itself
rather than the lintel or its bearing, but is
a consideration nonetheless. The wisdom
of ‘structural frames’ can be questioned:
what happens when someone later
changes them? And the last sentence is
a reminder to all designers to be aware
of the age-old problem of water in
external walls.
Adopting
technologies from
other industries
Here are some good ideas from
David Brett.
I was interested to see the comment in The
Structural Engineer (April issue): ‘We’d also
like to encourage articles demonstrating
how new technologies, such as thermal
imaging, drone surveys and laser scanning,
can be used in practice.’
We can learn from other industries in
this respect. I’m currently involved in the
offshore oil industry where we have ‘Joint
Industry Projects’ in which the oil majors,
floating production storage and offloading
(FPSO) vessel operators, and class
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019
Opinion
Letters
Send letters to…
All contributions to Verulam should
be submitted via email to:
tse@istructe.org
Contributions may be edited on the
grounds of style and/or length by the
Institution's publishing department.
"LEARNING FROM OTHER
INDUSTRIES AND
PROFESSIONS IS THE KEY
TO ‘FAST TRACKING’ NEW
INNOVATIONS AND
TECHNOLOGIES"
societies such as the American Bureau
of Shipping, Bureau Veritas, DNV GL
(Det Norske Veritas Germanischer Lloyd)
and Lloyd’s Register all work together
and jointly finance research into new
innovations and technologies which are
more economic, efficient and safer than
traditional methods.
We’ve found that learning from other
industries and professions is the key
to ‘fast tracking’ new innovations and
technologies, and have adapted well-
proven technologies from the nuclear,
aerospace, medical and forestry
industries to solve problems in the oil
industry. This has worked well and helped
to produce more effective, efficient and
economic solutions.
We have developed sophisticated
cameras and laser scanning equipment
from the nuclear industry to reduce
the risk of using divers, or personnel
working in hazardous areas, at height
or in confined spaces, etc. These have
produced significant savings (typically
over 50%) in the cost and time involved
in inspecting the hulls, critical valves
and storage tanks, etc., and reduced the
personnel required by over 70%.
Drones are also useful for certain
functions, such as inspecting flare towers
which are too hot for other methods.
However, they have limitations when
they are used in ‘beyond line of sight’
situations, as they are very difficult to
control accurately unless the pilot can
physically see them. The camera on
the drone only provides a small field of
33
02/05/2019 11:14
 Opinion
Letters
vision, which makes it difficult to control,
particularly in storage tanks with no light.
We have also adapted techniques from
the medical profession to ‘see inside’
critical elements to detect corrosion and
other problems concerning electrical
equipment. All these are designed to be
used while the vessel is on hire, on station
and in operation, so avoiding shutdowns or
out-of-service periods, the consequential
costs of which are horrendous.
We can all learn from each other, so
having an open mind and sharing problems
with colleagues from other industries and
professions is the key to making ground-
breaking discoveries. I understand that it
was only when a structural engineer and
surgeon got together that the modern hip
joint was developed.
Over one lifetime, developments in
metrology have revolutionised the way
we survey, giving faster, cheaper and
more accurate surveys. Drone surveys
have also been found useful in situations
from inspecting facades to penetrating
fire-damaged buildings. Hence, positive
feedback is to be encouraged and The
Structural Engineer will welcome input of
practical experience.
Safety factors
Readers always seem to enjoy a
puzzle on safety factors. Barry
Franchi offers us his views on the
safety margins against foundation
base overturning.
The following views are based on
traditional foundation design; that is,
the overturning moment is the working
moment, and W, a working load.
It is customary to obtain a factor of
safety on overturning of a foundation
base by taking moments about the base
edge and dividing the stabilising moment
by the overturning moment. This factor
of safety is often called a notional one (Fn
below) because it is difficult to imagine
the base rotating about an edge, unless
it is founded on very hard rock. In reality,
we know that the ground will fail first. The
Eurocode is also quite clear about this.
So, out of interest, I have calculated
alternative factors of safety. For the
traditional approach, the pressure under
the base is assumed to be a triangular
34
TSE87_33-35_Verulam.indd 34
shape, while, when computing a condition
at failure, the distribution is presumed
rectangular. I have also presumed that
the ground fails near the base edge at
a pressure equal to three times the safe
or permissible pressure. The foundation
is assumed to be square, with the
overturning moment acting at right angles
to one edge. Also, the vertical load, W,
is assumed to act at the centre of the
base. The differing factors of safety
for a defined notional factor (Fn) and a
factor based on ground failure (Fg) are as
follows:
Fn = 3.0 « « Fg = 2.5
Fn = 2.5 « « Fg = 2.12
Fn = 2.0 « « Fg = 1.75
Fn = 1.5 « « Fg = 1.38
Please note the following:
Generally, Fn = WL/2Mw where L =
the base side dimension and Mw = the
working overturning moment, so Mw =
WL/2Fn. Thereafter, the arithmetic follows
a traditional route of balancing eccentric
pressure under the base against the
forces applied to the base top. When
Fn = 2.0 for example (and based on a
triangular stress block), the maximum
working ground pressure = 8W/3A where
A = the area of the base. So, the failure
ground pressure = 8W/A.
Using the same approach for a ground
failure condition, but using a rectangular
stress block and the same working loads,
the width of the stress block = L/8, the
failure moment Mf = W(L/2 – L/16). So, Mf
= 0.438WL and Mw = W(0.5L – 0.75L/3),
so Mw = 0.25WL and Fg = Mf/Mw, which
equals 1.75.
In the case of a square crane base,
where the overturning moment can also
act along the base diagonal, for Fn = 2,
Fg increases to 1.8. On comparing the
results, it is comforting to see that Fn is
not that far out.
It is probable that many engineers of
my generation have already made this
comparison. For those who haven’t, I
hope that this exercise is of interest.
Barry seems to have concluded that the
differing approaches to computation
based on differing assumptions can
suggest differing safety margins, but
that the margin based on his suggested
(true) failure mode is not that much
below one calculated traditionally.
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
thestructuralengineer.org
Design life of
bridges
Denis Camilleri writes from Malta
inspired by a recent article on
bridge design.
Having undertaken my last bridge designs
in the early 1980s, Simon Bourne’s
double bridge technical feature was very
instructive (‘An introduction to bridges
for structural engineers’, parts 1 and 2,
January and March 2019). As quoted,
bridge engineering is not the same kettle
of fish as designing building structures.
Back in the 1980s, a good backing
in strength of materials, together
with bridge codes that were still in a
convenient and easy-to-use format, led
towards a clear design methodology,
whether it was for the strength or
the member vibration characteristics.
Finite element analysis was not much in
vogue back then, although some load
distribution tables were available.
This double feature outlined nine
issues, delving even into the Roman
Vitruvian principles, reminding us that
sustainability is not such a modern issue
after all! But it is the design lives of
bridges that aroused my further interest.
So, a bridge is designed for a lifespan of
100 years, while normal structures have a
50-year design life. What does this higher
design life imply? In concrete works,
higher covers are specified, while higher
strand losses are probably catered for in
prestressed concrete.
Is anything else implied in these
higher design lives, such as higher live
loadings, enhanced factors of safety,
higher characteristic wind speeds? How
do the three consequence classes, as
highlighted in Annex B: Table B3 of EN
"IS ANYTHING ELSE
IMPLIED IN THESE HIGHER
DESIGN LIVES, SUCH AS
HIGHER LIVE LOADINGS,
ENHANCED FACTORS OF
SAFETY, HIGHER
CHARACTERISTIC WIND
SPEEDS?"
02/05/2019 11:15

thestructuralengineer.org
1990, impact on bridge design?
Perhaps members of the bridge design
community can enlighten Denis over the
practical implications of extended design
lives?
Engineering in the
domestic sector
There are enough matters of
engineering interest in domestic
housing, and their extensions, to
worry engineers, David Wilson
observes – and asks a question.
In modern house design, I frequently see
two features (usually in the front elevation)
that significantly impact racking stability.
These are:
 single-storey front door vestibules with
a large opening below the external wall
from first-floor level to the roof to create
the hall
 part of the external wall from first-floor
level to the roof set back from the ground
floor wall.
I would be interested to hear from others
how Building Regulations Diagram 14
should be applied in such situations.
With the trend for adding basements,
roof extensions and general ‘opening up’,
there are dangers of creating instability.
Who else has views or experiences?
Soft skills are
essential for
success
Finally, David Brett takes up
a theme from our President’s
Inaugural Address with some
considerable enthusiasm.
Our President, Joe Kindregan, made a very
important comment in his inaugural address
earlier this year:
‘The education of structural engineers for
the future may have to involve less technical
depth, instead training people to have a
TSE87_33-35_Verulam.indd 35
complete perspective of problems, most of
which are non-technical.’
I couldn’t agree more. In order to attract
and retain the most talented students we
need to improve the profile of engineers
to a similar status as our Victorian
ancestors. They were the rock stars of
their age and understood the ‘soft skills’
required to promote their designs to the
investors concerned. They must have also
inspired a new generation of engineers to
follow in their footsteps.
We are entering an era of ‘lifetime
learning’ through the education of
engineers and Continuing Professional
Development (CPD) courses. As the pace
of change increases, this will probably be
the only way to maintain the professional
standards expected of our members.
We need to excite the ambitions
of talented students to follow in the
example of our distinguished members
who have produced some of the most
iconic structures in the world. As a young
engineer I was attracted to join Arup for
exactly that reason.
It was exciting to be working on
‘cutting edge’ designs and to work for,
with, and be inspired by such talented
engineers as Sir Ove Arup, and some of
our distinguished former presidents, Peter
Dunican, Peter Campbell, and Sir Edmund
(Ted) Happold, etc. It was only when I
went on to study as a postgraduate at the
London School of Economics, to learn
some of the ‘soft skills’, that I changed
direction and went on to a career in
marketing – again for engineering
companies.
It was important to understand the
language and motivations of investors,
politicians and civil servants, as they rarely
understand the engineering challenges
involved. Market research, cost–benefit
analysis, discounted cash flow, working
capital requirements, return on capital,
interest charges, etc. all needed to be
mastered and understood in order to
negotiate authoritatively with them.
I could count my counterparts on one
hand as it was rare for engineers to
move into marketing at the time. We need
an army of charismatic and articulate
engineers with the so-called ‘soft skills’ to
promote the profession to talented young
students, so that they can experience that
supreme sense of achievement in creating
iconic structures.
I still get a kick out of seeing structures
I designed many years ago – some of
which are now listed – every time I pass by
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019
Opinion
Letters
"IT WAS IMPORTANT TO
UNDERSTAND THE
LANGUAGE AND
MOTIVATIONS OF
INVESTORS, POLITICIANS
AND CIVIL SERVANTS"
them. We are fortunate that our designs
are usually visually impressive, unlike a
microelectronics engineer producing a
brilliant silicon chip which only their peers
can appreciate.
However, ‘soft skills’ can be equally
satisfying, as I was able to help
promote and export British designed
and manufactured structures to over
125 countries throughout the world
and license the technology to a dozen
other countries where exporting was
not possible. We received the Queen’s
Award for export achievement as a
result. I also led the market research
for a new method of construction for
offices, schools, hospitals and hotels, etc.,
which went on to complete over 1000
projects throughout the UK, and received
the Queen’s Award for technological
achievement.
Our President is to be congratulated
in highlighting this issue and others in his
address. Let’s hope that his words are
heeded and the challenge taken up in the
direction of engineering education and
CPD courses in future.
From a lifetime in engineering, Verulam
can certainly empathise with the
President that day-to-day problems
more often arise from dealing with
people than dealing with technology.
After all, technology normally does as
it’s told and doesn’t have emotions.
However, we must observe balance:
there are many dedicated engineers
who just want to stick to building safe
structures and that’s hard enough.
Whatever the demands, there is room
for everyone, not just ‘the brightest and
the best’. Nonetheless, for us all, an
increased understanding of costs and
skills in communication would not go
amiss.
35
02/05/2019 11:15
 Opinion
Book review
Review Allan Mann enjoys this account of the scientific and engineering advances of Word War II,
despite the field of structural engineering perhaps not being given the attention it deserves.
Engineering Hitler’s
downfall: the brains
that enabled victory
Author: Gwilym Roberts
Publisher: Whittles Publishing
Price: £18.99
ISBN: 978-184995-386-3
There is no shortage of books on World War II.
Indeed, it seems amazing that an event lasting
just six years could still generate interpretation
75 years later. On the other hand, the war was
a conflict so tumultuous, and a cause of so
much social change, that continuing curiosity is
easily explained. For our own profession, war-
time demands stimulated enormous changes
laying the foundations for engineering products
and knowledge we use today.
The author of this book is a past-president
of the Institution of Civil Engineers and its
drafting seems to have been his labour
of love. Most books on the war deal with
strategy, campaigns and bravery: all essential.
Nevertheless, in modern warfare no navy can
sail without docks; no air force can function
without airfields or service facilities; and no
army can progress without infrastructure
supporting movement. Above all, no war can
be waged without massive production facilities
and victory may well go to those who produce
the most and replace their losses fastest.
Mr Roberts has set out to record the
incredible contribution engineers of
all disciplines made to the war effort,
cataloguing their inventions and portraying
key personalities, all against the background
of unfolding events. Most of these will be
well known, from the Battle of Britain to the
bombing of Hiroshima. Many of the engineering
inventions will also be known: the iconic
Spitfire, radar, bouncing bombs and V2 rockets.
Less well known will be a myriad of other
inventions: weapons, navigation and detection
systems, and so on.
36
TSE87_36_Book Review.indd 36
"PERHAPS THE PRE-
EMINENT STRUCTURAL
ENGINEERING
CONTRIBUTIONS WERE
TEMPORARY BRIDGING AND
THE MULBERRY HARBOURS"
Perhaps our own discipline of structural
engineering is under-represented or maybe
hidden within short descriptions. The Merlin
engine gets its just headlines, but the
(structural) evolution of air frames supporting
the engine is scarcely mentioned. Think that
at the beginning of World War I, it was just
about possible to fly. Yet a mere 25 years later,
the Allies were flying massive four-engined
bombers.
Moreover, those planes were so heavy
that getting them airborne off a grassy field
was no longer feasible and required proper
airstrips. Think of the construction demands
of laying so many strips at record rates. In the
Pacific, production demands were so intense
that they spawned the evolution of much of
today’s commonplace heavy civil engineering
equipment.
Concrete is not highlighted: I suppose it’s
hard to compete with the ‘glamour’ of radar
and the cavity magnetron. Yet civil engineering
did make a huge contribution. The Germans’
Atlantic Wall (17M cubic metres of concrete)
is only recorded in an appendix. Concrete
protection, in the form of pill boxes, tank traps
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
thestructuralengineer.org
and air-raid shelters, is described, as are
concrete roof protections to the German
rocket launch sites, but there was clearly no
space to go into technical detail.
Perhaps the pre-eminent structural
engineering contributions were temporary
bridging and the Mulberry harbours, and
space is devoted to them both. Institution
Past-President Sir Alan Harris gets a good
mention, along with his post-war interests in
prestressing. What is not mentioned is that the
‘secret’ of prestressing was brought to Britain
before the war by an Austrian Jewish refugee
(Walter Mautner) and used to good domestic
effect during the war.
It’s possible to quibble with some historical
views that are popularly accepted as fact.
The foreword by Admiral Lord West gently
points out that the Battle of Britain did not
actually prevent a German invasion: other
circumstances made that highly improbable.
Likewise, reading the book gives an
impression that Russian contributions were
perhaps incidental. The Russians would not
see it that way.
Page 1 includes an assertion (from Max
Hastings) that ‘Churchill’s nation far surpassed
Germany in the application of science and
technology’. Many would argue that is an
exaggeration. Mr Roberts’ book rightly lauds
the scientific and engineering skills deployed
in cracking the German Enigma machines. But
such effort would never have been required
had it not developed its machines in the first
place. Ultimately, whose technical community
was the more ingenious is a fruitless debate.
This book concentrates on developments
made by UK engineers and, as such, it is a tale
well worth telling and the characters involved
are well worth reading about.
Allan Mann
BSc(Eng), PhD, FREng, FIStructE
Allan has been an active member of the Institution for
most of his ‘engineering’ life. He was awarded the
Gold Medal in 2011. To mark the 70th Anniversary of
VE Day in 2015, he published ‘Engineering victory:
structural advances during World Wars I and II’ (The
Structural Engineer, 93 (5), pp 10–17).
02/05/2019 11:11
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 Opinion
Book review
Review This detailed book with excellent examples and illustrations will make a useful
reference text on matrix methods of analysis, concludes Ian May.
Matrix methods of
structural analysis
Author: Praveen Nagarajan
Publisher: CRC Press
Price: £100 (hardback); £37.79 (e-book)
ISBN: 978-0-81538-150-1
As the title states, the subject of this book
is the matrix methods of structural analysis,
in particular the stiffness and flexibility
methods applied to the linear elastic
analysis of framed structures. As readers
will likely be aware, the matrix stiffness
method is the technique used in the
multitude of computer packages available
for frame analysis and design.
The book comprises five chapters. The
first covers, briefly, coordinate systems,
equivalent nodal loads, and a useful section
on indeterminacy, but assumes the reader
has prior knowledge of the derivation
of fixed-end moments for beams, the
limitations of superposition, etc.
In the first part of the second chapter,
the stiffness and flexibility matrices for
truss, beam, and space-frame elements
are derived. It is assumed that the reader
has a basic understanding of the element
stiffness relationships and understands the
use of product integrals. The second part
of the chapter gives a review of energy
methods and an alternative derivation of
the stiffness and flexibility coefficients
using an energy approach.
Chapter 3 continues on from the previous
chapter to use the member flexibility
matrices to develop the matrix flexibility
method for the analysis of structures. A
number of examples of the use of the
method to determine displacements in
statically determinate structures are given.
This is followed by extending the method
to determine both the displacements and
38
TSE87_38_Book Review.indd 38
"EACH CHAPTER HAS
NUMEROUS EXAMPLES TO
ILLUSTRATE THE
APPLICATION OF THE
THEORY. EACH STEP IS
DESCRIBED IN DETAIL"
internal forces in statically indeterminate
structures. Finally, the effects of lack of
fit of members and thermal changes are
considered and included in the method.
Chapter 4 deals with a matrix stiffness
approach in a similar way to that used
in Chapter 3 for the flexibility method,
using the member stiffness matrices
developed in Chapter 2. Some additional
general structural theory is included, e.g.
the principle of contragradience. As for
the matrix flexibility method examined
in the previous chapter, there are
numerous examples to explain the method
thoroughly.
The first part of the final chapter,
Chapter 5, is concerned with the direct
stiffness method, i.e. the method than
forms the basis of the majority of structural
programs. The second part gives a short
but useful introduction to the non-linear
analysis of structures and discusses both
material and geometric non-linearities.
The appendix contains a MATLAB code
for the analysis of plane trusses, which
appears to serve little purpose as there are
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
thestructuralengineer.org
many free computer software programs
available for the linear analysis of beam,
truss and space-frame structures.
Each chapter has numerous examples
to illustrate the application of the theory.
Each step is described in detail to help
the reader; this can be very helpful as
the author has explained parts of the
analysis which are often glossed over in
textbooks. The illustrations are excellent.
It is difficult to decide what audience
the book is aimed at. There are too
many gaps for it to be a mainstream
undergraduate text, e.g. very little
about superposition, assumption of
understanding of the unit load method.
It also includes a significant amount of
material, e.g. the matrix flexibility method,
which would be of little value in an
undergraduate course, as it is not used to
any extent in practice.
In general, the analysis of a structure
can be considered to comprise three
parts: the modelling of the structure
and loadings, solution of the structural
equations, and verification of the results.
While in practice it is the modelling and
verification that require most engineering
judgement and should form a significant
part of an engineer’s education, this book
only covers the solution of the structural
equations.
The presentation of a wide range
of topics often not included in basic
structural textbooks could make it a
useful reference for undergraduate and
postgraduate students and for engineers
responsible for structural analyses.
Ian M. May
CEng, FIStructE, FICE
Ian was, prior to his retirement, Professor of Civil
Engineering at Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh.
His research interests included impact, and fatigue
behaviour and repair of structures involving both
large-scale testing and numerical modelling. He
was also particularly interested in the teaching of
structural analysis.
02/05/2019 11:12
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the most important theoretical background. References provide an
opportunity for wider reading.

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The Essential Knowledge Series is a core resource for structural engineering students,
covering all the fundamental topics - from structural materials to computer analysis.

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p39_TSE.May19.indd 39 01/05/2019 14:59

 At the back
Diary dates
Diary
dates
Note that more current information may be available from the
Institution website: www.istructe.org/events-and-awards
MEETINGS AT HQ
47–58 Bastwick Street, London
EC1V 3PS, UK
Tuesday 21 May
Gold Medal Address
James O’Callaghan
17:30 for 18:00
Thursday 23 May
IABSE Annual Lecture 2019:
What We Do
Guy Nordenson
17:00 registration; 17:30 lecture; 19:00
optional boat trip & dinner
Price: Lecture free; boat trip dinner £75
Tickets: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/
iabse-annual-lecture-2019-and-thames-
boat-tour-tickets-56328771873
INDUSTRY WORKSHOPS
(Held at HQ unless otherwise stated)
Tuesday 14 May
Hadley Group Industry Workshop:
Engineering profiles for construction
Seminar, discussions and
demonstration of the DesignSuite Pro
software package for the design of
complex structural frames.
08:30–13:00
Registration: www.hadleygroup.
com/events/engineered-profiles-for-
construction
Thursday 6 June
Oasys Industry Workshop:
Solving structural vibration
40
TSE87_40-41_DiaryDates.indd 40
challenges
09:00–09:30 Registration and coffee
09:30–10:15 Session 1: Dynamic modal
analysis
10:15–11:00 Session 2: Seismic analysis
11:00– 1:45 Session 3: Footfall analysis
11:50–12:35 Workshop: Practicalities of
modelling for dynamic analysis
12:35–13:30 Networking and lunch
Registration: oasys@arup.com
Tuesday 18 June
Swedish Wood Industry Workshop:
Tall timber sustainable construction
post Hackitt
Kirsten Haggart (Waugh Thistleton),
Professor Gideon Henderson, Robert
Schmitz (White Arkitketer) and Gavin
White (Director, Ramboll UK)
10:15–15:00
Registration: www.eventbrite.com/e/
tall-timber-sustainable-construction-
post-hackitt-tickets-58983116088
Thursday 19–Friday 20 September
(Sheffield)
6th International Workshop on
concrete spalling due to fire
exposure
The Diamond, University of Sheffield,
32 Leavygreave Road, Sheffield S3 7RD
Contact: Firespallingworkshop2019@
sheffield.ac.uk
Web: firespallingworkshop2019.group.
shef.ac.uk
May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer
Regional Group Committee members
should submit details of forthcoming
events to: regionsupport@istructe.org
TECHNICAL LECTURE
SERIES
(Held at HQ unless otherwise stated)
Wednesday 15 May
Taking precast concrete to the limit
Kaare K.B. Dahl
17:30 for 18:00
Registration: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/
taking-precast-concrete-to-the-limit-
registration-59754335827
HISTORY STUDY GROUP
Tuesday 14 May
Bituminous geomembranes: their
use in military contexts, historical
perspectives (joint meeting with the
International Geosynthetics Society)
Eugene Gallagher, Bill Craig and Sam
Hunt
CPD COURSES
(Held at HQ unless otherwise stated)
Monday 13 May
Eurocode 6: Masonry design
John Roberts
Members £290 + VAT; non-members
£370 + VAT
10:00–17:30
Booking: www.istructe.org/cpdcourses
Tuesday 14 May
Eurocode 7: Geotechnical design
Paul Morrison and Stuart Pennington
Members £290 + VAT; non-members
£370 + VAT
thestructuralengineer.org
Unless otherwise stated,
evening technical meetings
start at 18:00 (with
refreshments from 17:30)
and are free of charge
to attend. Registration
is required via events@
istructe.org
History Study Group
meetings start at 18:00 with
refreshments from 17:30.
Registration is not required
except for the Annual
Business Meeting held in
January.
CPD courses are held at HQ
unless otherwise stated.
Times and costs vary.
10:00–17:30
Booking: www.istructe.org/cpdcourses
Thursday 16 May
Concrete basements
Jenny Burridge
Members £290 + VAT; non-members
£370 + VAT
10:00–17:30
Booking: www.istructe.org/cpdcourses
Friday 17 May
Conceptual design for structural
engineers: An introductory course
Oliver Broadbent
Members £290 + VAT; non-members
£370 + VAT
10:00–17:30
Booking: www.istructe.org/cpdcourses
Thursday 23 May
Eurocode 5: The essentials of timber
design
Keerthi Ranasinghe
Members £290 + VAT; non-members
£370 + VAT
10:00–17:30
Booking: www.istructe.org/cpdcourses
Discount available if booked in
combination with course Eurocode 5:
Connections and advanced topics in
timber design (26 June) (www.istructe.
org/events/hq/2019/june-2019/
eurocode-5-connections-and-advanced-
topics-in-tim)
02/05/2019 11:16

thestructuralengineer.org
REGIONAL GROUPS
Canada
Wednesday 8 May
CPGCE – Rehabilitation of the
Parliamentary Precinct in Ottawa
Professor Nigel Shrive
The Danish Canadian Club, 727 11
Avenue Southwest, Calgary, Alberta,
T2R 0E3
Cost: $5 entrance fee for non-
sponsoring organisation members
18:30 for 19:00
Registration: www.eventbrite.ca/e/
rehabilitation-of-the-parliamentary-
precinct-in-ottawa-tickets-60796803877
Tuesday 14 May
Seismic design of steel structures
(CSA S16 CL#27 and NBCC)
Robert Tremblay
The Pit (Room 202), Architecture
Building, Ryerson University, 325 Church
Street, Toronto, Ontario M5B
18:30 for 19:00
Registration: www.eventbrite.ca/e/
seismic-design-of-steel-structures-csa-
s16-cl27-and-nbcc-tickets-60189971826
Wednesday 15 May
Chartered Engineers Pacific – The
5th generation of mobile networks
Faramarz Jabbarvaziri
Conference Rooms, Accent Inns,
Burnaby, 3777 Henning Drive, Burnaby
V5C 6N5
19:00–21:00
Contact: events@
charteredengineerspacific.ca
Caribbean
Thursday 2–Friday 3 May
Seismic design of reinforced
concrete structures (2-day
workshop)
Kerrin Burgess
University of Technology, Jamaica, 237
Old Hope Road, Kingston 6, Jamaica
Price: Members $10,000 JMD; non-
members $15,000 JMD
08:00–17:00 (EST) both days
Contact: istructe.caribbean@gmail.com
Secretary: Marie-Terese Louis
(marietereselouis@gmail.com)
Chester and North Wales
TSE87_40-41_DiaryDates.indd 41
At the back
Diary dates
Thursday 2 May Najwa Jawahar (eric.li@walsh.co.uk)
Stay safe or court disaster Crowne Plaza Hotel, Stephenson
Jan Andresen Quarter, Forth Banks,
Holiday Inn Chester – South, Wrexham Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 3SA Surrey
Road, Chester, Cheshire CH4 9DL 17:45 for 18:15
18:30–20:00 Wednesday 15 May–Wednesday
Secretary: Trevor Little 26 June
Secretary: James Drew (trevor.little@wsp.com) CM & AM examination preparation
(james.drew@ramboll.co.uk) course (7 evenings)
University of Surrey, Duke of Kent
Northern Ireland Building, 388 Stag Hill, Guildford, Surrey
East Midlands GU2 7XH
Tuesday 21 May Price: £100 (Fee payable on first evening)
Tuesday 14 May Chartered Membership examination 18:30–21:00
CARE and the conservation of seminar – Part 1 Contact: Jeff Walker
structures Room PFC/02/011, Peter Froggatt (jeff@anddesigns.co.uk)
Anthony Clarke Centre, Queen’s University Belfast, Registration: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/
The Yew Lodge Hotel, Packington Hill, University Road, Belfast BT7 1NN cm-am-examination-preparation-course-
Kegworth, Derby DE74 2DF 17:30 for 18:15 2019-tickets-55150150585
18:00 for 18:30
Contact: Azhar Raoof Tuesday 28 May Monday 20 May
(azhar.raoof@hotmail.com) Chartered Membership examination Design of high-rise modular
seminar – Part 2 construction
Secretary: Rozina Aslam Room PFC/02/011, Peter Froggatt Prof. R Mark Lawson
(rozina.aslam@arup.com) Centre, Queen’s University Belfast, Lecture Theatre M, University of Surrey,
University Road, Belfast BT7 1NN Guildford GU2 7XH
17:30 for 18:15 18:00 for 18:30
Lancashire and Cheshire
Secretary: Andrea Johnston Secretary: Ruslan Koutlukaev
Tuesday 21 May (andrea.johnston@mottmac.com) (ruslan.koutlukaev@gmail.com)
Learning lessons from structural
failures
(joint meeting with ICE Manchester) Scottish Wales
Paul McNulty
University of Manchester, Renold Tuesday 21 May Saturday 18 May
Building, PO Box 85, Sackville Street, Structural failure, robustness and Chartered Membership preparation
Manchester M1 3BB disproportionate collapse course
17:45 for 18:30 (CPD seminar) Esam Al Kelaby
Ruth Haynes Future Inn Cardiff Bay, Hemmingway
Secretary: Alan Mardan Stirling Court Hotel, University of Stirling, Road, Cardiff CF10 4AU
(alan_mardan@hotmail.com) Airthrey Road, Stirling FK9 4LA Price: £80
Price: Graduate Members £60.00; Other 09:30–16:30
Members £70.00; non-members £80.00 Registration: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/
Midland Counties 14:30 for 15:00. Finishes at 19:00 istructe-wales-group-exam-preparation-
Registration: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ course-tickets-59008373634
Tuesday 28 May seminar-structural-failure-robustness-
Encapsulation of Chernobyl power and-disproportionate-collapse- Secretary: Gary Mitchell
station tickets-56187018886 (g.mitchell@cambria.co.uk)
Phil Nelson
University of Birmingham, Building Secretary:
Y3 – Mechanical and Civil Engineering (honsec@istructescotland.org) Yorkshire
Building, Room G34, Edgbaston,
Birmingham B15 2TT Wednesday 15 May
18:00 for 18:30 South East Counties Yorkshire Structural Award Winner
2018 – Piazza Learning Centre, York
Secretary: Richard Davis Tuesday 28 May York University – Piazza Learning Centre,
(richardavis@hotmail.co.uk) Bryden Wood York YO10 5GJ
Kevin Masters 18:30–20:00
Croydon Park Hotel, 7 Altyre Road, Contact: richard@
Northern Counties Croydon, Surrey CR9 5AA gibsondesignconsultancy.com
18:00 for 18:30
Tuesday 14 May Secretary: Farzad Neysari (farzad.
London Wall Place development Secretary: Eric Li neysari@gmail.com)
TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 41
02/05/2019 11:17
 At the back
Spotlight on Structures thestructuralengineer.org

Spotlight on
In this section we shine a spotlight on papers recently published in Structures – the Research Journal of The
Institution of Structural Engineers.
Structures is a collaboration between the Institution and Elsevier, publishing internationally-leading research across
the full breadth of structural engineering which will benefit from wide readership by academics and practitioners.
Access to Structures is free to paying-grade Institution members as one of their membership benefits,
with access provided via the ‘My account’ section of the Institution website. The journal is available online at:
www.structuresjournal.org

Special issue: Advanced manufacturing and materials

The latest issue of Structures (Volume 18, April 2019) is a special issue on ‘Advanced Manufacturing and Materials for Innovative Structural
Design’. The issue is based on papers presented at a symposium of the 29th annual International Association for Shell and Spatial
Structures (IASS) symposium in Boston, USA (16–20 July 2018).
Guest Editors Dr John Orr, Professor Arno Pronk and Professor Tim Ibell have selected an article on seismically stabilised tile vaults for
the Rwanda Cricket Stadium as their featured article from the issue. Featured articles are made available free of charge to all for a period
of six months following publication.
The full issue contains the following articles:

Article title Authors Available at:

Precast Slab Structures Made of Carbon Sebastian May, Oliver Steinbock, Harald https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.005
Reinforced Concrete Michler and Manfred Curbach

Case Studies in Topological Design and Daniel Tish, Wes McGee, Tim Schork, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.002
Optimization of Additively Manufactured Cable- Geoffrey Thün and Kathy Velikov
nets

Design, Construction and Testing of a Low Will Hawkins, John Orr, Paul Shepherd and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
Carbon Thin-Shell Concrete Flooring System Tim Ibell istruc.2018.10.006

A Cable-Net and Fabric Formwork System for Tomás Méndez Echenagucia, Dave Pigram, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
the Construction of Concrete Shells: Design, Andrew Liew, Tom Van Mele and Philippe istruc.2018.10.004
Fabrication and Construction of a Full Scale Block
Prototype

Sharanam: Case Study of a 15 Meter Span Lara K. Davis, Mahesh Varma and Satprem https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.014
Earthen Conical Vault Maïni

Ice Formwork for High-Performance Concrete: V. Sitnikov https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.004

A Model of Lean Production for Prefabricated
Concrete Industry

Structural design of a lattice composite James Solly, Nikolas Früh, Saman Saffarian, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.019
cantilever Lotte Aldinger, Georgia Margariti and Jan
Knippers

Structural Optimization of Cross-laminated Paul Mayencourt and Caitlin Mueller https://doi.org/10.1016/j.

Timber Panels in One-way Bending istruc.2018.12.009

Rosenstein Pavilion: Design and structural Daria Kovaleva, Oliver Gericke, Jonas Kappes, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.007
analysis of a functionally graded concrete shell Ivan Tomovic and Werner Sobek

Rwanda Cricket Stadium: Seismically stabilised Michael Ramage, Timothy J. Hall, Ana Gatóo https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
tile vaults and M. Wesam Al Asali istruc.2019.02.004

Design of Truss Structures Through Reuse Jan Brütting, Joseph Desruelle, Gennaro https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.006
Senatore and Corentin Fivet

42 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

TSE87_42-43_Spotlight.indd 42 02/05/2019 11:17

 At the back
thestructuralengineer.org Spotlight on Structures

Design and production of an arch built of Lluís Enrique and Joseph Schwartz https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
precast stackable components istruc.2018.12.005

Space Truss Masonry Walls With Robotic R. Duballet, O. Baverel and J. Dirrenberger https://doi.org/10.1016/j.istruc.2018.11.003
Mortar Extrusion

The 2017–18 design and construction of ice Arno Pronk, Mark Mistur, Qingpeng Li, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
composite structures in Harbin Xiuming Liu, Rijk Blok, Rui Liu, Yue Wu, Peng istruc.2019.01.020
Luo and Yu Dong

Special issue: Editors’ Featured Article

Rwanda Cricket Stadium: Seismically stabilised tile vaults
Michael Ramagea,b, Timothy J. Halla,b, Ana Gatóoa,b and M. Wesam Al Asalib
a
Light Earth Designs LLP, UK
b
Cambridge University, UK

The Rwanda Cricket Stadium, completed

in 2017, uses compressed soil-cement
tiles, thin-tile vaulting, and geogrid
reinforcement for seismic stabilisation in
Kigali’s moderate risk earthquake zone.
The vaults follow the natural resolution
of forces toward the ground, closely
mimicking the parabolic geometry of a
bouncing ball and evoking the cherished
hilly topography of Rwanda. The masonry
vaults in compression allow the use of
geogrid embedded within the mortar
layers, adding global ductile behaviour to
the thin shell composite of low strength
tiles. Structural analysis is based on
thrust lines, with additional envelope
for the thrust lines to leave the profile approaches are combined in a permanent developing world. Employing air-dried,
of the masonry computed from the structure, with the largest vault spanning hand-pressed soil tiles, produced using
tensile capacity added by the geogrid. 16m with a rise of 8m. The Rwanda Cricket local labour, this method of construction
Construction follows traditional thin-tile Stadium is a fusion of advanced structural has proved to be innovative, cost-effective
techniques adapted for new environments analysis and architectural design with and beautiful.
and uses compressed earth tiles as labour-intensive, locally sourced material
pioneered at the Mapungubwe Interpretive production offering a much-needed The full paper is available at https://doi.
Centre in South Africa. Here, the two solution to building sustainably in the org/10.1016/j.istruc.2019.02.004.

New impact statement

Design of composite cold-formed steel flooring systems
Pinelopi Kyvelou, Leroy Gardner and David A. Nethercot
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Imperial College London, UK

The benefits of using composite action
in steel-concrete construction are well
accepted and widely used; the potential
benefits of using composite action
between cold-formed steel beams
and wood-based boards in flooring
systems were, until the present study,
neither understood nor utilised. In the
investigation presented, the authors’ own
experimental and numerical data have
been used to underpin the development of
design rules to harness composite action
in such systems.
The developed design rules, the
theoretical background of which is
fully described, follow the fundamental
principles of current structural design
standards for steel-concrete composite
construction. Thus, they can be easily
adopted by designers and are suitable
for incorporation into future revisions of
the Eurocodes. They allow practitioners
to incorporate the beneficial influence of
composite action in their designs, which is
shown to lead to up to 100% increases in
capacity and 40% increases in stiffness.
The full paper is available at https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.istruc.2017.09.006.

TheStructuralEngineer | May 2019 43

TSE87_42-43_Spotlight.indd 43 02/05/2019 11:18

 At the back
Library update thestructuralengineer.org

Library update
Learning from structural failures

Learning from structural failures – resulting failures without actually naming them. L’Ambiance Plaza
from technical, natural or human factors – is Bridges have been a common source of (1987), Pipers Row
an important way to make our structures study as engineers have strived to push car park (1987),
safer. The Library holds a large number the boundaries of what is possible. Good Ramsgate Walkway y
of books, reports and papers on both the starting points are Akesson’s Understanding (1994), Emley
subject overall and on individual failures. bridge collapses (Taylor & Francis, 2008), Moor transmission
Many books tackle the subject generally Scheer’s Failed bridges: case studies, mast (1969) and
and use real-world case studies to illustrate causes and consequences (Ernst & Sohn, Charles de Gaulle
it – these include: 2010) and Smith’s Airport (2004).
Airpo
 Petroski: To engineer is human: the role paper on ‘Bridge Bridge failures
s
of failure in successful design (Macmillan, failures’ in the ICE include the Tayy
1985) Proceedings1. Bridge (1879),
B
 Petroski: To forgive design: understanding The Library Quebec Bridge
Q e
failure (Belknap Press, 2012)* holds all five of the ((1907 and
 MacAlevey: Structural engineering failures: Institution of Civil 11916), Tacoma
lessons for design (Createspace, 2010) Engineers Forensic c Narrows Bridge
N
 Delatte: Beyond failure: forensic case engineering (1940), the box girder collapses
(1
studies for civil engineers (ASCE, 2009)* conferences (1998 8 at Milford Haven and West Gate
a
 Campbell: Learning from construction to 2013) and the (1970) and Koblenz (1971), and the
(1
failures: applied forensic engineering quarterly journal recent failures at Florida International
re
(Whittles, 2001) ICE Proceedings University and Morandi’s Polcevera
U
 Bosela et al.: Failure case studies in civil – Forensic Viaduct in Genoa.
Vi
engineering: structures, foundations, and Engineering.
the geoenvironment, Library catalogue and E-library
Li
2nd ed. (ASCE, Th Library catalogue (https://istructe.
The
2013)* Institution publications
In cirqahosting.com) can be searched online
 Levy and Salvadori: As well as Allan Mann’s Lessons from with several of the books mentioned here
Why buildings fall failure (Essential Knowledge Text No.
fa (indicated with an asterisk) also available in
down: how structures s 5, 2016)2 attention is drawn to Sean the E-library (www.istructe.org/e-library).
fail (W.W. Norton, Brady’s ‘Lessons from failure’ series in
B
1994) The Structural Engineer (www.istructe.
T *Marked publications are available in the
 Kaminetzky: Design org/lessons-from-failure).
o E-library.
and construction Although not always resulting in
failures: lessons from
m ffailure, it is important here to mention
forensic investigations
ns tthe work of Structural-Safety
REFERENCES
(McGraw-Hill, 1991). ((incorporating SCOSS and CROSS;
www.structural-safety.org) on safety
w
Whittle’s Failures in matters concerned with the design, E1) Smith D.W. (1976) ‘Bridge failures’, Proc.
ICE, Part 1, 60 (3), pp. 367–382
concrete structures: construction and use of all types of
case studies in structures. E2) Mann A. (2018) Essential Knowledge
reinforced and Text No. 5: Lessons from failures [Online]
prestressed concrete (CRC Press, 2013)* Individual failures Available at: www.istructe.org/essential-
describes a range of types of concrete Researching an individual failure will involve knowledge (Accessed: April 2019)
looking for a final report issued by the
investigating body and any journal articles
"MANY BOOKS TACKLE on the incident, but also a search for books CONTACT

THE SUBJECT GENERALLY or papers on the original construction.

Rob Thomas (Manager – Library and
AND USE REAL-WORLD
There have been many structural failures
Information Services)

CASE STUDIES"
over the years, some more well-known than ETel.: +44 (0)20 7201 9105
others. Some of the best known are Ronan EEmail: library@istructe.org
Point (1968), Hyatt Regency walkway (1981),

44 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

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Directory May19.indd 45
Services Directory
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 Recruitment
Telephone: +44 (0)20 7880 6235 Email: tsejobs@redactive.co.uk

Attract the right candidate for less -

Advertise for just £379
Only The Institution of Structural Engineers can provide such a dedicated and receptive audience, whose
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TSE Recr May19.indd 47 01/05/2019 14:59

 Recruitment
Telephone: +44 (0)20 7880 6235 Email: tsejobs@redactive.co.uk

PART-TIME, HOME BASED

Chartered Structural Engineer
Kent, Essex, Herts, London, Watford
We are a small structural and civil consultancy practice established
over 30 years ago. We need one or two chartered structural engineers
based in certain areas of London and the South-East to handle jobs
local to them on a self-employed, sub-consultant basis but covered
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and structural design of alterations and extensions, both domestic
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but wishes to keep their hand in. Must be chartered and able to
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The perfect place to find the latest

structural engineering vacancies
The Structural Engineer 350
Jobs is the official jobs jobs
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average
of Structural Engineers every month

thestructuralengineer.org/jobs

TSE Recr May19.indd 48 01/05/2019 14:59


knowledge based
recruitment in
structural engineering
consultancy
Structural
(Parametric) Engineer
Central (South) London
Up to £52,500 + Benefits Ref: 51696
Niche consultancy has a requirement for
a Structural (Parametric) Engineer to join the
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in another premier or niche
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consultancy has a requirement for a Chartered
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Associate &
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MARKET UPDATE
The market is surprisingly
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Salaries generally flat due to poor
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TSE Recr May19.indd 49
Recruitment
Telephone: +44 (0)20 7880 6235 Email: tsejobs@redactive.co.uk
Associate Director/
Director
Central London Ref: 51379
Up to £72,500 + Benefits
Mainstream Central London consultancy
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IMAGES SHOW CLASSIC PROJECTS UNDERTAKEN BY SOME OF OUR CORE CLIENTS
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ECKERSLEY O’CALLAGHAN Mainstream medium-sized consultancy has EXPEDITION
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working on typical London build & refurbishment sectors
refurbishment projects. in the UK.
Structural Revit
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Up to £55,000 + Benefits
We have around 15 roles for Structural
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becomes candidate-driven. Candidates will
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“building structures” draughting
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and modelling skills gained
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01/05/2019 14:59
 At the back
The Drawing Board thestructuralengineer.org

The Drawing Board

Judged by Ron Slade

This month Ron has selected two sketches – by Luis Correia of AKT II and Jakub Nowikowski of Pole
Structural Engineers. Each receives an e-book of their
eir choice from the Institution
Institution’s
s current catalo
catalogue.

Ron’s comments Luis Correia

Two very clear and confident sketches produced View Luis’ sketch in full
for different reasons. I like the use of colour in at www.istructe.org/
both. Luis Correia, a Senior Engineer at AKT II, drawing-board/may-
says that his sketch was produced to illustrate the 2019/luis-correia.pdf.
construction sequence of a steel transfer beam
within the Ghana National Cathedral project.
Jakub Nowikowski, at Pole Structural Engineers,
produced his sketch to be read in conjunction
with a structural survey report concerning an
existing timber framed building. He says the frame
construction was lacking typical joint connections
such as mortise and tenons and all the frame
elements were fixed together by insufficient
numbers of nails or screws. There were no
restraining or bracing elements providing either
appropriate robustness, restraint or lateral stability.
Beams over the supporting posts were notched Jakub Nowikowski
to allow for overlap connection. Unfortunately, y, View Jakub’s sketch in full at www.istructe.org/
some of the beam bearings were over-notched, ed, drawing-board/may-2019/jakub-nowikowski.pdf.
producing visible signs of distress. Due to the
inadequate connection details between the
members of the timber roof trusses and timber er
frame elements, the recommendation was to
introduce additional timber bracing members
and steel framing brackets and plates to provide ide
enhanced lateral stability and robustness. The e
sketch was easy to understand, and the clientt
found it more helpful than a written report.

Ron Slade
BSc(Eng), CEng, FIStructE

Ron Slade is Structural Director at a Chartered Member of the first appointed as a director in 1982.
WSP. Ron received his BSc First Institution of Structural Engineers in Ron is the author of Sketching for
Class Honours in Civil Engineering at 1971 when he was awarded the Engineers and Architects, published
City University, London and became Institution’s A.E. Wynn prize. He was by Routledge.

DON'T FORGET TO SUBMIT YOURS...

To enter, submit a sketch to tse@istructe.org together with a short description to put it into context (150 words). Sketches must be hand drawn
(no CAD, except for ‘guided freehand’) and from a real project (i.e. not drawn for the competition). The next deadline is 1 July 2019.

50 May 2019 | TheStructuralEngineer

TSE87_ATB_50_Drawingboard.indd 50 02/05/2019 11:20

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concerned with the design, construction and
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and de-identified before being published. Reports can also lead to Alerts which influence the safety
of existing and new structures.

Visit the website to register for Newsletters and Alerts and to view the database of reports.

www.structural-safety.org
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