One of their salesmen did a demonstration for us. It seemed slick. But we didn't purchase it. The licensing fees seemed high especially for multiple offices and users. And we had several engineers who said they could live with Enercalc, warts and all, which was already paid for, to have us pursue this with our company owners.
I used this at my previous job. I only used the pre-written programs, never created one myself. I wanted to, but never had the time to sit down and figure it out.
I did like the pre-written programs. Easy to use, and easy to check (minimal hidden calculations).
I haven't used TEDDS, but I got one of them demo packets 10 years ago or so. I was comparing it to MathCAD. I was so much more familiar with MathCAD that I preferred it.... though I could see how folks would like TEDDS.
One complaint that I had was how expensive they were. Really, I just wanted a way to make my hand calculations look neater / better. I didn't need anything really advanced. Just basic formatting (like a word processor) and basic math (multiplication, divising, subtraction, addition).
Both programs seemed very expensive for that purpose. I understand that the programs have a lot of power that I would not be using, but I always wished that someone would bring a simpler and cheaper product to market to compete with them.
We have Tedds now and I am for the most part happy with the program. I have used Encercalc and StruCalc. I prefer Tedds to both.
I have wrote a few calculations in word and I prefer it to a spreadsheet because you can easily find mistakes and it is easy to review. However there are times I wish I was using mathcad for complex problems. I also like it because I'm still an EIT so it was nice to see all of the equations used shown in the out put. It does organize calcs nice but I have yet to really use that feature how it should be used. Its funny because that was part of the reason we bought (to organize calcs better) but we have not put the time into mastering the task.
I didn't read all the posts but NO, no trial version. They can do a webinar for you which is really good. I have used FastTrack very little and I like the idea of having one model for gravity and lateral design (as opposed to two in RAM). It can also do curved beams, something RAM & RISA can't do. Tedds is a nice software too, I guess comparable to RISA 2D for simple beams. It can also do the dreaded Appendix D anchor bolt design.
Again, I have used it only on a few occasions and don't have it in my office.
Long term user of TEDDs and can only say good things about the software, bit of a pain wth error trapping but apart from that its top. Easy to use, well laid out calculations and a good staritng point for calcuations people are not to used too.
The built in forms (UK version anyway) covered most things and the output looked nice. We use CADS Smart Engineer where I am now and I find it more clunky and the output doesn't look as nice.
If we ever had a problem or thought we'd found a bug, CSC were pretty prompt at getting back to us.
TEDDS lets you save the calculation anywhere on a computer, which means anyone with TEDDS can open it. One thing I particularly dislike about SE is that it saves the calculation in a database on the computer it is installed on, therefore you have to log on as the user who created it to open the calc. (Unless someone knows another way around).
I used to write a lot of calculations using TEDDS for Word. I found it hard to get started with it and you can use the built in data tables for beam sizes, reinforcement bars etc. I did find the documentation for this a bit poor.
If you go along the route of writing your own calculations, every variable has a unit associated with it so sometimes if you lift an equation form the design code, you have to multiply what looks like a constant in the code by something with units or it will throw a wobbly. The RC design equations from BS8110 always had this 'feature'.
A plus side though is that it's made me figure out how the design equations have been derived and they make more sense than when they tried to go through the derivations at university!
I'd be interested in any interesting tedds calcs that you have created. I have created some myself and even posted the results on here before. However mine are usually pretty crude. Most involve retaining wall calcs, some masonry, steel in torsion and a couple other random calcs. I'd be glad to share.
What type of calcs do you guys usually write?
I have not checked into this but it would be interesting to see if people would be willing to share their calcs on CSC's site.
RFreund:
A few example calculations wouldn't go amiss somewhere on the internet to give people an idea how how to do things. Unfortunately I don't have access to the ones I created but might ask an ex colleague if he can send me one.
The most complex one I did was a buried water tank (essentially 4 retaining walls, plus a slab with openings).
One neat thing I managed to do was draw it up in Sketchup, import the diagrams into Word, add dimensions and put the value of variables (e.g. height, thickness etc.) into text boxes on top of the picture so there was an annotated 3D sketch. It was a PITA getting it to work but it looked good in the end!
