In Advance Steel, you can insert structural elements such as bracings to reinforce structure capacity to withstand various forces such as gravity, seismic, and wind loads. Very often you need to create vertical and horizontal bracing in your bracing. In Advance Steel, the process is simple because you can use the Bracing Tool.
Inserting The Bracing
Accessing The Bracing Tool
You can access the Bracing Tool from two places on the ribbon. First, in the Home tab:
Home Tab > Extended Modeling Panel > Bracing
The second place where you can access the Bracing Tool is the Extended Modeling Ribbon tab:
Extended Modeling Tab > Structural Elements panel > Bracing
Be advised about this very important detail: the new bracing is created at the current UCS plane. Because of that, you first need to align the XY plane of the UCS to the plane where you want to insert the bracing.
Using The Bracing Tool
When you activate the Bracing Tool, you will be asked to select two opposite points – corners of the bracing members. Once the two points are established, the dialog box will open where you can adjust all the properties and options of the bracing:
Type And Section Tab
In this tab (shown in the picture above), you can specify the bracing type and sections to be used. Let’s discuss all the options available:
Bracing Type
You have three options available for use: Crossed, Single, and Inserted. Here is an illustration of all three options:
Member Type
From this drop-down list, you can specify the member type of the bracing. Simple, Double Mirrored, and Double Flipped is available. By default, Simple is selected.
Member Split
You can specify in the drop-down list whether you want to split the bracing members or not.
Section Size
You can specify the bracing member section type and size here.
Model Role
You can specify the role for the bracing section in the drop-down list. By default, Vertical Bracing is selected. If you are creating horizontal bracing, you can select Horizontal Bracing from the list.
Positioning Tab
Specify the positioning of the bracing sections:
Other Side
This check box is only available if Double Mirrored or Double Flipped from Member Type is selected. In any of those cases, if you check this box, the mirrored or flipped section on the other side of the original bracing section will be placed.
Reversed
Only available when creating a Single type bracing, this action will insert the section between the other two corners instead of the two selected corners.
Back To Back / Toe To Toe
This option is available only when creating a Crossed Bracing type. When you select this option, the cross-bracing sections will be touching back to back.
Gap
This is available when creating a Crossed Bracing type. Specify a gap between the cross-bracing members.
Offset in X / Offset in Z
Specify the alignment of the system axes of the bracing sections with the placement points selected to insert the bracings. You can select to align the system axes to the back, front, middle, center, or gauge line of the bracing sections. It is possible to use the edit boxes on the right of these lists to enter an offset value.
Countercurrent
Specify if the first or second bracing member will be placed in a countercurrent position.
Change Long Leg Side
If you are not using equal angle sections as bracing members, you can change the long leg side direction. Simply check this box.
Geometry Tab
In the Geometry tab, you can specify the layout and offsets of the bracing sections.
Layout
Define the bracing layout. It can be centered between the placement points or from the start to end points.
Lenght
Define the length of the bracing system; by default, the length is automatically calculated by the two corner points from where you specified to create the bracings.
Height
Define the height of the bracing system. By default, it is calculated by the two corner points you specified to create the bracings.
Number of Fields
Here you can specify how many bracing systems you need between the selected corner points. In the picture below, on the bottom left, the value of 1 is typed into the Number of Fields, and on the upper right corner of the same picture, the value of 2 is typed into the Number of Fields.
Field Size
Set the size of the fields when creating more than one field.
Offset from Top
While creating the bracing, set the offset of the bracing sections from the top corner point selected.
Offset from Bottom
Set the offset of the bracing sections from the bottom corner point selected while creating the bracing.
Offset per Field
Specify the offset between multiple bracing fields.
Offset
Specify the horizontal offset of the bracing sections from the placement points.
This concludes the Horizontal & Vertical Bracing Tutorial. Good luck using all the methods and tools described above. If you find this article valuable, please subscribe to my blog to be notified whenever I publish a new article.
If you are interested in upgrading your hardware or software, make sure to check out My Toolbox article, where I share information about the tools I use and special discounts you can use as well.
If you are into Advance Steel –
