We kicked off a series of Design and Analysis of Welded Connections seminars throughout New Zealand last month presented by Professor Adolf Hobbacher – one of the world’s leading experts on weld design issues, and our very own General Managers Dr Stephen Hicks and Dr Michail Karpenko. Not only do they help shed light on…
HERA, SCNZ and the Institute of Welding are pleased to announce a one-day seminar on Design and Analysis of Welded Connections, which will be run throughout July and August in Hamilton, Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Queenstown. This seminar provides an overview of the theory of design of welded steel structures and components, with plenty of hands-on…
A regular enquiry received by HERA has been the application of fatigue design in steel bridges. On one hand, some designers have had trouble interpreting the current design rules; whilst on the other, many fabricators have expressed concerns on more expensive butt welds being specified for fatigue details where this might not be entirely necessary.…
Rules for evaluating the design resistance of headed stud connectors through-deck welded within steel decking are provided in NZS 3404.1, 13.3.2.2. Due to the pitch of the ribs in the deck, it is normally not possible to provide enough shear connectors to provide a resistance equivalent to the lesser of: the tensile resistance of the…
The NZ Geothermal Workshop, held in Taupo this year, had a higher attendance and number of presentations than in the past, and presented a very positive vibe for the geothermal industry overall. A number of delegates from the AGGAT team also attended this conference from both HERA and University of Auckland. The AGGAT team members…
Following the establishment of the New Zealand National Group of the International Association of Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE), Structural Systems General Manager Dr Stephen Hicks attended the IABSE Conference in Geneva in September 2015. The conference objective was ‘Providing Solutions to Global Challenges’, which was underpinned by following global themes: Climate Change and the…
The ASME Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) Conference 2015 held in Brussels, Belgium this year was the third consecutive conference of its kind and takes place every two years. A total of 214 submissions for presentation were received for this conference of which 142 were accepted, 53 of them in poster presentations. The conference attracted more…
HERA is currently working on assessing the fire performance of a typical New Zealand light steel frame floor of a multi-storey building with the aim to provide input into the fire section of the resulting design guide. As the first part of the research, an overseas experimentally-tested floor slab has been investigated numerically by advanced…
The annual ArchEng workshop continues to go from strength to strength, thanks to co-operation with industry associations such as HERA. A CCANZ initiative that began in 2011, it expanded this year to involve the timber and steel sectors. Now that all three major building materials, concrete, steel and timber, are involved, ArchEng is poised to…
The two most advanced design guides on floor vibrations are SCI Publication 354 and CCIP-016 for steel-framed buildings and reinforced concrete buildings, respectively. Both design guides permit engineers to predict the response of structures due to human-induced vibrations to enable comparisons to be made with acceptance criteria contained within standards such as ISO 10137. Standards…
HERA is pleased to welcome Dr. Jing Cao to the Structural Systems division. Jing graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering from Tongji University in Shanghai, China. He obtained his PhD from the University of Southampton, UK, which was fully supported via EPSRC research funding. He has design and assessment experience in the UK, China, Australia…
For structural steel products to be free from serious problems in production and in service, it is necessary to provide a suitable level of quality management from the design phase, through material selection, into fabrication, and subsequently inspection. Requirements for welding/fabrication activities are given in the Code of Practice of the NZ Steel Fabricator Certification…