Need opinion for a good bridge software

[JTKMac]

Hi all,
My boss has told me that there's going to be quite a number bridge jobs coming in within the next few months. I'm currently doing the design manually with the help of staadpro and it's really time comsuming and tedious. So, he's asking me to source for a good software so that we can be more efficient. My defination of "good" is that the software should do both steel and PC girders design. I notice most software vendors split them into separate modules, like steel girder , prestressed concrete girder, piers, seismic analysis,..etc That means we have to buy a few modules instead of just one and that can be oftenly quite expensive. Most of our bridge jobs involve rehab and deck replace. So, to all the experience bridge engineers out there, any suggestions are welcomed.

 

[Qshake]

Most if not all bridge software is delineated by material and analysis and design too. That is those programs focusing on analysis may not do design. Those that do design have to worry about updates to the ever changing codes - or that you have to worry about whether the program is updated to the latest code.

Most work on rehab is done manually anyway with some computer analysis. In the case of rehab it is very important not overload the existing structure with the new - this is not something that is easily programmed and so you don't find much in the way of help on this.



Regards,
Qshake

Eng-Tips Forums:Real Solutions for Real Problems Really Quick.

 

[miecz]

Check with your DOT. Our DOT Bridge Manual limits our choices, and, in practice, the DOT limits the choices even more than thier own manual.

 

[transmissiontowers]

I don't do bridges, but at the GTStrudl user's group I have seen a few presentations from users that use it on bridges. It is a general use program that has steel design and concrete design capabilities. When you call tech support, you talk to the software developers in Atlanta. I have used MS Excel as a preprocessor to generate the GTStrudl input file for structures that have similar geometry. You can go to their web site and look at past user group presentations to get an idea of the bridge design capability.

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