FEM-Design Wall Module
In Brief
Within FEM-Design Wall, arbitrary 2D structures loaded in their own plane (stress in z-direction is 0) can be analysed for static and dynamic calculation and reinforcement design.
The Wall module offers design solutions for shear and load bearing walls, and also for other kinds of structural elements, such as webs of deep beams (including holes), steel plates, etc. Orthotropic conditions as well as regionally varying thickness can be defined.
The program is equipped with a powerful automatic mesh generator which generates an optimal finite element mesh for the current geometry, support and load conditions. With the Load groups tool (also available in other design modules), the program automatically generates all possible loading combinations including the most unfavourable from the defined load types (permanent, variable and accidental) and displays maximum and minimum result values. These features offer significant time saving as the all loading combinations can be analysed in one operation.
Concrete walls are designed according to several national codes including Eurocodes. Design forces are then calculated as a combination of the normal and shear stresses in the wall. Tension reinforcement requirements are calculated and checks are made to ensure that allowable compressive stresses in the concrete are not exceeded.
A typical situation where the wall module can be used is in the analysis of a concrete wall with openings, used for stabilising a building against lateral loads, usually wind loads.
Load-bearing walls
The two results views of a wall design from the Hotel Westin, Warsaw (top right) show how the required reinforcement is concentrated in the lower part of the wall. Here the columns were used as structural elements in the lower storey to provide more flexibility, while concrete walls in the upper storeys were used to carry the load from the connected slabs.
Beam opening
Another frequent problem is when openings have to be made in beam webs because of ventilation ducts etc. Of course, this problem cannot be analysed with beam theory, but a plane stress model is an excellent tool to analyse the changes in the stress distribution and to calculate reinforcement requirements.
