Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
(OP)
I'm trying to find some "good" procedures that can be used to design a slab-on-grade and a grade beam. (Note: By grade beams I'm talking about a foundation system that is used to support walls above...similar to a wall/strip footing)
If there is a section in the ACI 318/99 code please direct me to that section. This information is not needed for a specific problem but for my own knowledge in the future.
For a slab-on-grade (and "mat" foundations for VERY small structures), I'm looking for the procedure including the appropriate checks (punching shear, moment, etc..?) I'm also looking for the minimum steel generally accepected in slab on grade construction. Is the ACI 0.0018 min steel overkill??
Grade beams are especially troublesome for me to find design information on. Searching this forum I see some people suggesting they are designed as a wall/strip footing. My concern with this is that wall/strip footings are generally longitudinally reinforced along the bottom only while most grade beams, I've seen so far, are doubly reinforced (top and bottom). Am I missing something??
Background: I'm 3 months out of school and I work at a water utlilty. They hired me on as a sturctural engineer but the sturctures knowledge around the engineer department is VERY limited and, therefore, I get very little help internally. My problem so far is that the loads on the projects I've done so far are SO small. It would be EASY for those with experience, but for me it is very confusing.
Any good structures books you could recommend would also be helpful as I slowly build my library up. Thanks in advance.
If there is a section in the ACI 318/99 code please direct me to that section. This information is not needed for a specific problem but for my own knowledge in the future.
For a slab-on-grade (and "mat" foundations for VERY small structures), I'm looking for the procedure including the appropriate checks (punching shear, moment, etc..?) I'm also looking for the minimum steel generally accepected in slab on grade construction. Is the ACI 0.0018 min steel overkill??
Grade beams are especially troublesome for me to find design information on. Searching this forum I see some people suggesting they are designed as a wall/strip footing. My concern with this is that wall/strip footings are generally longitudinally reinforced along the bottom only while most grade beams, I've seen so far, are doubly reinforced (top and bottom). Am I missing something??
Background: I'm 3 months out of school and I work at a water utlilty. They hired me on as a sturctural engineer but the sturctures knowledge around the engineer department is VERY limited and, therefore, I get very little help internally. My problem so far is that the loads on the projects I've done so far are SO small. It would be EASY for those with experience, but for me it is very confusing.
Any good structures books you could recommend would also be helpful as I slowly build my library up. Thanks in advance.





RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
So, from my viewpoint and with the target of precluding problems, reinforce top and bottom and make the structures as stiff as economy permits.
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
I should have also added that at my work I do not have the aid of any structural analysis software or any FE software. I get to work off of VERY CONSERVATIVE assumptions!! Luckily everything I have designed so far, and most of what I will design in the immediate future, consists of VERY light loads!!
Thanks again for your response!!
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
Thanks for your help. I'll be "lurking" and learning for the next few years!!
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
download analys.ese from
http://www-gmap.mecanica.ufrgs.br/gmap_dop.html
All resumes in making searches in a search engine for freeware structural design. Myself have thousands of sheets posted for free download at the collaboratory site..yet it requires access to not free- Mathcad 2000 Pro.
Make the searches, it is fruitful.
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
RE: Slab-on-Grade and Grade Beam Design
For you case, however, I doubt that using finite element technics would be helpful, as the loads are so small, so does the scales, that the foundation under their practical dimensions act almost rigidly. A rigid foundation approach for strip foundation would satisfactorily and conservatively solve your problem, and save a lot of time for you.