GT STRUDL "NEW" Release Version 29.1

GT STRUDL KEY FEATURES

GT STRUDL "OVERVIEW"

GT STRUDL "ANALYSIS"

GT STRUDL "STEEL DESIGN"

GT STRUDL "REINFORCED CONCRETE DESIGN"

GT STRUDL "OFFSHORE"

GT STRUDL + "CIS/2"

GT STRUDL is a world class computer-aided structural engineering software system for assisting engineers in the structural analysis and design process.  It is a sophisticated, efficient, highly reliable, and fully integrated general purpose structural information processing system capable of supplying an engineer with accurate and complete technical data for design decision making.

GT STRUDL completely integrates graphical modeling, frame and finite static, dynamic, and nonlinear analysis, finite element analysis, structural frame design, graphical result display, and structural database management into a powerful menu-driven information processing system.  In over 30 years of use, GT STRUDL is one of the most widely accepted Computer-Aided Engineering and Design (CAE/ CAD) tools for the structural analyst and structural design engineer. GT STRUDL is used on a regular basis by thousands of engineers in over 30 countries.

GT STRUDL is validated and certified in full conformance to the applicable provisions of the U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission software quality assurance and quality control regulations.

GT STRUDL performs general purpose structural analysis and design, as well as structural database processing, on a very broad range of structural problems.

GT STRUDL is used by industrial organizations, construction firms, heavy and light industry design firms, power industry design firms, utilities and manufacturing companies, governmental agencies, and educational institutions for the frame and finite element static, dynamic, and nonlinear analysis and the structural design of a wide variety of structure types including but not limited to:

• Process plants and industrial structures of all kinds
• Commercial and residential low and high rise building structures
• Long span roof support systems
• Large tower structures including power transmission and communication structures
• Bridge structures including cable stayed, suspension, arch, truss, plate girder, and prestressed concrete
• Power plant structures such as pipe support systems, cable trays, generator pedestals, platforms, nuclear containment structures, and pressure vessels
• Massive hydraulic structures such as locks, dams, tainter, and miter gates
• Civil works structures such as reservoir and flood control dams, culverts, bridges, transportation facilities, and others
• Offshore platforms
• Radar dishes and their supporting structures
• Pipe intersection analysis for stress- index/ stress- intensity determination
• Manufacturing machinery and manufactured component parts
• Construction and agricultural equipment such as crane booms, loaders, backhoes, earth movers, tillers, and others
• Transportation equipment and component parts such as automobile and truck frames and bodies, railroad cars and connectors, aircraft wings and fuselages, ship structures, and others
• Dock and shore structures

Key Features Include:

Powerful menu driven graphical Windows® NT/98/2000/ME/XP interface.

Broad range of non-linear analysis features, structural definition and modeling capabilities.

Library of over 100 member and finite element types.

Powerful menu driven mesh generation.

Built-in Model Wizard for the fast creation of many common structural models.

Generalized automatic data generation for all classes of structural information.

Data sheets to define / view / edit / sort information in a spreadsheet format.

Efficient static and dynamic (response spectrum, transient, harmonic, and steady state) analysis processing.

Tools to help locate model instabilities.

Sophisticated and highly efficient equation solvers.

Comprehensive steel and reinforced concrete structure design according to a variety of design code specifications.

Offshore platform analysis and design.

Design provides for a high level of user control of the result dependent and iterative analysis/ design/ display/ evaluation/ reanalysis / redesign/ decision- making process.

Problem database inquiry and display features for easy database interaction.

User controlled database management facilities including database storage, retrieval, and updating features.

Display Graphical display of results:

Static and animated displays of deformed structure, mode shapes, and transient response, stress contours

Force and moment diagrams and envelopes

Steel code check pass / fail status and interaction values

Outstanding customer support.

Fully supported application software product with an established record of world-wide use in a variety of structural engineering and analysis applications.

POWERFUL WINDOWS INTERFACE

The problem solving requirements of engineers are communicated to GT STRUDL through a standard Microsoft Windows menu-driven and graphical user interface In addition, GT STRUDL offers a structural engineering command interface as a compliment to its powerful interactive graphical modeling features. Engineers can retain and exercise control over all processing facilities to the extent required to meet engineer-defined needs, rather than merely inputting data to a predefined computer process.

GRAPHICAL MODEL CREATION

GTMenu is a graphical user interface within GT STRUDL that is designed for the generation, display, and changing of structural model data. Some of the major features of GTMenu are as follows:

Model Creation

Joints, members, finite elements, properties, constraints, releases, and loadings may be graphically created.

A DATABASE DRIVEN SYSTEM , NOT A FILE DRIVEN SYSTEM

Unlike any other structural design and analysis system, GT STRUDL maintains a comprehensive structural database which contains problemdescription characteristics specified by the engineer, as well as results generated as a consequence of one or more analyses and/or design processes. The engineer may save, restore, display, update, correct, add, delete, activate, or inactivate any information in the problem database. This unique feature provides the engineer with significant time savings in the iterative structural analysis/design/ decision-making process wherein the computer stores, processes, and displays information upon request, while the engineer exercises decision-making responsibilities. Engineers can make requests for information "on the fly", rather than having to make decisions about what output they will want while defining the problem.

BROAD RANGE OF MEMBER AND FINITE ELEMENT TYPES FOR FRAME AND CONTINUUM MECHANICS

GT STRUDL contains a large library of member and finite element types consisting of 7 member types (constant or variable cross-section), over 100 conventional, isoparametric, and hybrid formulation finite element types, and many special transition elements including:

• Plane truss / frame / grid and space truss / frame members.
• Curved plane and space frame member element including internal pressure effects.
• Plate bending elements to model thin to moderately thick plates (3, 4, and 8 node triangles and quadrilaterals).
• 3-D solids (6 to 20 node triangular prisms and straight and curved edge bricks).
• Thin shell elements (3 and 4 node triangles and quadrilaterals with 5 or 6 degrees-of-freedom per node).
• Axisymmetric elements (4 to 8 node quadrilaterals) for modeling solids of revolution.
• Large library of special transition elements for plane stress, plane strain, Axisymmetric stress (4 to 8 node quadrilaterals) and 3-D solid (8 to 20 node bricks) problems.
• Special finite element for modeling shear walls and floor slabs where a rotational degree-of-freedom is provided about an axis normal to the element in order to allow coupling of member rotational degrees-of-freedom with the element (e.g., beam bending may now be coupled with a shear wall).
• Multilevel superelements (i.e., sub-structures defined from user specified collections of members, finite elements, and other superelements) may be defined for large and complex linear static analysis problems.

VARIABLE DEGREE - OF - FREEDOM STRUCTURAL MODELS

• Structures may be composed of any combination of member and/or finite element types whether they have the same or different type and number of displacement degrees-of-freedom per node.
• Only the minimum number of relevant displacement degrees-of-freedom are automatically used by GT STRUDL in the analysis of a structure resulting in significant analysis cost reduction.

FULL SET OF MEMBER AND FINITE ELEMENT PROPERTY SPECIFICATIONS

Member element properties include :

• Prismatic and variable section member property input including cross-section area, shear areas, torsion constant, bending moments of inertia, section moduli, cross-section dimensions, location of shear center, and others.
• Prestored table specification of member properties including wide flange, channel, tee, single and double angle, pipe, tube, round and rectangular solid bar, and other shapes.
• Further, users may specify member properties by giving a flexibility or stiffness matrix.

Finite element properties include:

• Element type and thickness for isotropic elements.
• Element rigidity matrix input for orthotropic or anisotropic material properties.
• Order of numerical integration for certain elements for better control of accuracy and efficiency.

BOUNDARY CONDITIONS

Member boundary conditions may be specified by:

One or any valid combination of the six general force boundary conditions at one or both ends of a member.

Linear elastic flexible member boundary condition connections to structure joints (i.e., up to twelve (12) translation and rotation springs may be modeled between the ends of members and joints).

Rigid joint size and rigid links using member eccentricities and end joint sizes.

Any combination of end joint size and end eccentricity conditions at one or both ends of a member.

Structure boundary conditions may be specified by :

One or any valid combination of the six general force and/or kinematic boundary conditions at a support joint.

Support restraint directions which may be parallel or non- parallel (rotated) to the global reference frame.

One or any valid combination of the six translation and rotation linear elastic or nonlinear spring supports at support joints which may be parallel or non-parallel (rotated) to the global reference frame.

Automatic location and processing of planar joints.

CONSTRAINTS AND MASTER-SLAVE RELATIONSHIPS

Describe many joint degree-of-freedom constraints and master-slave relations.

Joint "tie" for equality of displacements.

Rigid pin, rigid plane, rigid plate, and rigid solid definitions for modeling rigid body structural behavior.

High-rise building analysis using mathematically rigorous rigid body floor modeling techniques.

COMPREHENSIVE LOADING SPECIFICATIONS

An unlimited number of independent static loading conditions may be composed of any combination of seven loading types, which are:

Joint loads (forces and moments).

Joint displacements (translation and rotation).

Member loads (concentrated and uniformly and linearly distributed forces and moments in the local, global, or projected global coordinate systems).

Member temperature loads (axial and bending).

Member distortions (fabrication errors and up to six (6) generalized initial strains).

Joint temperature loads for finite element temperature variations (in-plane stretching and bending).

Element loads. (edge, surface, and body forces in the local, planar, global, or projected global coordinate systems).

Automatic dead load generation specifications for:

• Member dead loads generated as uniformly distributed member loads and/or equivalent joint loads, and including dead load factors.
• Finite element dead loads generated from element body force specification.
• Moving load generator may be used to define standard AASHTO highway vehicles or user defined trains of moving loads over any contiguous line of members in a structure as independent static loading conditions.
• Independent loading condition cases may be formed as a combination of the specifications of other independent and dependent loading condition cases.
• Dynamic joint loads include acceleration, velocity, or displacement time history and harmonic variations.
• Dynamic response spectra (acceleration, velocity, displacement vs. frequency, period) for multiple damping values may be input and stored for future reference or may be selected from prestored earthquake spectra.
• Pseudo static load cases may be formed from earthquake response spectra analysis results for standard loading condition processing such as combining with static analysis load case results.
• An unlimited number of load combinations (Dependent Loadings) may be formed with user-defined combination factors.
• Any combination of independent and/ or other dependent static and/or pseudo static load cases may be formed by an Algebraic summation of results, or by using an RMS or ABS (absolute sum) combination.
• General recursive load specification error detection.
• Dependent load results may be computed during any stiffness analysis, or at any time subsequent to one or more stiffness analyses.

MATERIAL PROPERTY AND BETA ANGLE SPECIFICATIONS

• Linear elastic material properties may be specified, including Young's modulus (E), shear modulus (G), Poisson's ratio, coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE), and Weight Density.
• Different members and/or elements may have different material properties.
• Implicit specification of material properties for members and finite elements identified as steel, aluminum, or concrete.
• User specified BETA angles for local member coordinate system axis orientation.
• Automatic computation of BETA angles from user specified BETA reference planes (i.e., 3rd-point BETA angle specification).

VARIABLE UNITS SPECIFICATION

• Units of length, force, angle, temperature, and time may be changed by the user at any point, and as often as the engineer desires for both problem description data and result output data.
• Both the English system and SI system of units may be used entirely interchangeably throughout a GT STRUDL execution.