Steel in the News

Make your structural steel visions come to life! How? By entering AISC’s third annual Steel Sculpture Competition!

If you’re an AISC full or associate member, join this year’s competition and create your own innovative steel sculpture for a chance to have your company featured in MSC and more.

Here are the rules:

• The sculpture must be steel (and only steel), but shapes, sizes and steel type can be your personal preference.
• The sculpture must be made entirely by your staff.
• The finished sculpture must fit in a 2-ft by 2-ft by 2-ft box (for shipping purposes).
• All entries must include a title and the name of the company submitting the project.
• There’s no theme! But keep in mind the characteristics of steel: adaptable, economical, quick and sustainable.

Submit photos of your sculpture by September 13, 2013 to AISC’s Jenny McDonald at mcdonald@aisc.org.

From September 16-27, all entries will be posted to AISC’s Facebook page (www.facebook.com/AISCdotORG) where they’ll be voted on by fans. The top five finalists will be put on display at the 2014 NASCC: The Steel Conference, March 26-29 in Toronto, where the ultimate winner will be chosen by attendees. The winner will also be featured in MSC and receive a catered lunch for their company.

Learn more about the competition at www.steelday.org/sculpturecomp.  

Check out this year’s winning sculpture: “Steel Life-Cycle” (pictured left).

The competition is part of SteelDay, the structural steel industry’s largest educational and networking event, held nationwide. It’s scheduled for October 4 this year; mark your calendars! If you’re interested in hosting or attending an event, visit www.steelday.org.

Student team members from the University of Washington College of Engineering - the home team in this year’s National Student Steel Bridge Competition finals, held earlier this month - hustle to construct their steel bridge under the pressure of the clock. Photo: AISC

For the second consecutive year, a team of students from the University of California, Berkeley (pictured left), have been named champions in the 2013 ASCE/AISC National Student Steel Bridge Competition (NSSBC), which took place May 31-June 1 at the University of Washington’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering in Seattle.

Also for the second straight year, second place overall went to the team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. University of California, Davis, took third place overall.

About 600 students from 49 qualifying teams convened to showcase their engineering skills in the competition finals. This inter-collegiate competition challenges civil engineering students to work together to design, fabricate and construct their own scaled steel bridges in the shortest time and under specific building constraints.

The bridges were judged in six key categories related to steel design and construction: construction speed; stiffness; lightness; construction economy; display; and efficiency. The teams with the best combined rankings across all six categories earn overall award recognition.

To view the top three winners in each category, see AISC’s press release. The complete competition rankings can be found at www.nssbc.info.

You can also view photos from this year’s competition on AISC’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/AISCdotORG in the “NSSBC 2013” photo album. A video showing highlights from the competition will soon be available on AISC’s YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/AISCSteelTV.

Next year’s NSSBC will be held May 23-24 at the University of Akron in Ohio. To learn more about the NSSBC, visit www.aisc.org/steelbridge or www.nssbc.info.

Are you as excited about the new “Man of Steel” movie as we are? It opens in cinemas everywhere tomorrow, June 14.

Based on the DC Comics character Superman, the film will be a reboot of the Superman film series, portraying the character’s origin story. (You can read more about the film on Wikipedia.)

The movie was filmed in the Chicago area, including some downtown locations not too far from AISC’s headquarters.

AISC’s Scott Melnick’s editorial from the January 1993 issue of MSC is called “The Man of Steel,” and you can learn how he came up with this Superman slogan: “They don’t call him the Man of Concrete.”

You still have time to register for AISC’s live webinar happening tomorrow, June 13, focused on “Design of Diaphragms, Chords, and Collectors in Steel-Framed Buildings.”

The design of a lateral system for a building is not complete without a complete path delivering the load to the braced frames, moment frames or shear walls. Diaphragms serve this important function, providing the load path while also restraining the gravity system against sway buckling.

This live webinar will review the types of diaphragms often found in steel-framed buildings as well as the components of diaphragms. Special diaphragm strength requirements in ASCE 7 and special requirements for chords and collectors will be reviewed and design methodologies for diaphragm components will be presented.

The 1.5-hour webinar will begin at the following times, relative to time zone:

Noon PDT
1 p.m. MDT
2 p.m. CDT
3 p.m. EDT

The cost of the webinar is $185 for AISC members, $285 for non-members and $155 for students and educators. (Fees are based on a per-site connection basis. Purchase one site connection and any number of members in your company or organization may view the webinar at that site connection. All attendees are eligible to receive CEUs/PDHs.)

Registrants will receive access to a PDF file of the presentation slides prior to the webinar, CEU/PDH certificates for all attendees upon completion of the live webinar (0.15 CEUs/1.5 PDHs) and complete instructions for accessing the live webinar.

Partial funding for this webinar is provided by the California and Vicinity Steel Information Council (CVSIC).

To register for the live webinar and learn more about other upcoming AISC webinars, visit www.aisc.org/webinars.

The ballot submission period for the National BIM Standard – United States Version 3 (NBIMS-US V3) is now open, giving all building professionals the opportunity to offer their ideas to influence the future use of building information modeling (BIM) in the U.S.

A BIM is a shared resource of knowledge about a facility that can be used to make decisions throughout its life cycle, from the initial idea, to design and construction, through daily operations and eventual demolition.

Because BIM covers all aspects of the building process, everyone in the construction industry will be impacted as the use of BIM becomes the standard operating procedure. Therefore, the National Institute of Building Sciences’ buildingSMART alliance is asking professionals from every sector in the building industry to participate in the development process of NBIMS-US V3. Ballots can amend or revise current NBIMS-US content or they can propose adding the latest technologies, processes and practices not yet included in the standard.

Since NBIMS Version 1- Part 1 was first released in 2007, the content of the standard has evolved, including information exchange standards for construction operations and product specifications. NBIMS-US V2 is a consensus-based standard and includes reference standards, information exchange standards (which are built upon the reference standards) and best practice guidelines to support users in their implementation of open BIM standards-based deliverables.

The ballot submission period for NBIMS-US V3 ends August 19, 2013.

You can view the schedule on the National BIM Standard website (www.nationalbimstandard.org).

Individuals and organizations that are not yet NBIMS-US members can learn how to get involved. (Only members can submit ballots and vote on changes to the standard.)

NBIMS Project Committee members can download ballots now.

The final pieces of the 408-ft steel spire for One World Trade Center were lifted to the top of the tower and installed last month. Using a crane located high above street level, ironworkers lifted the final two pieces off of a temporary work platform on the roof of One WTC and attached them to the previously installed 16 sections of spire. During the installation, ironworkers set and tightened 60 bolts at an altitude of 1,700 ft. Photo: The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey

One World Trade Center is now the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere and the third-tallest in the world, standing at a symbolic 1,776 ft high.

Eighteen barrel-shaped sections of steel make up the tower’s spire, which weighs nearly 760 tons and will function as a world-class broadcast antenna.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has released additional photos and video from last month’s installation of the final spire pieces atop One WTC.

You can also view a spectacular photo on CBS News’ website showing WTC ironworkers placing the spire on top of the skyscraper.

One WTC is set to open in 2014. More information on its construction progress can be found at www.panynj.gov/wtcprogress. 

University faculty are invited to apply for the 2014 AISC Milek Fellowship, a four-year, $30,000-per-year award. Designed to help promising university faculty members conduct structural steel research, the winning faculty member will also be recognized in MSC as well as receive free registration at NASCC: The Steel Conference for the four years following their selection as an AISC Milek Fellow.

The Milek Fellowship program is designed to contribute to the research careers of young faculty who teach and conduct research investigations related to structural steel, while producing research results beneficial to designers, fabricators, and erectors of structural steel.

Proposals will be accepted until September 15, 2013. Required application information includes:

• Candidate’s name, affiliation, mailing address, telephone and email address
• Description of the research to be conducted
• Discussion of the relevance and usefulness of the research to structural steel construction (design, detailing, fabrication, installation, maintenance, renovation, materials, management, protection from corrosion etc.)

The intent of the award is to support students with high potential to be valuable contributors to the U.S. structural steel design and construction industry. Funds are provided to conduct research that meets the long-term needs of the structural steel industry; assist in leveraging additional outside funds for fellowship-related research; and develop graduate students for academic and design careers in the structural steel industry.

The selected faculty fellow should strive to fund a doctoral candidate each year with at least half of the yearly fellowship funds, and the chosen students will be named AISC Graduate Fellows and featured in MSC.

The award is named after William A. Milek, former AISC vice president of engineering and research, to recognize his invaluable contributions to AISC and the structural steel industry.

For complete information about the Milek Fellowship program, past faculty fellows, and the full proposal requirements and application, visit www.aisc.org/facultyfellowship.

It’s alive! After a four-year delay, The Godfrey Hotel Chicago, the city’s first staggered steel truss project, has just restarted construction in the River North neighborhood.

The project first began construction back in the fall of 2007 and stalled less than a year later. AISC’s Steel Solutions Center had completed a conceptual study for the project and along with ASE hosted a breakfast presentation in early 2008 by members of the project team, as well as a tour of the construction site.

You can find the recorded presentations, photos from the site tour, a time-lapse video during the initial construction, and information about the structural steel staggered truss system at www.aisc.org/staybridge. (The right image shows a rendering of the project, courtesy of Valerio Dewalt Train, Architect.)

The project’s staggered steel truss design allows for large open spaces and potential cost savings. The 14-story upscale lifestyle hotel will include 221 rooms, with 194 studio suites and 27 one-bedroom suites. It is slated to open this summer.

Tomorrow, June 5, COAA Illinois is hosting a tour of the restarted construction underway at the project site and members of the project team will discuss the problems and solutions of resuming a construction project after a long-term delay, as well as the building’s innovative staggered steel truss design.

For more information about the event and to register, visit www.coaa.org/Chapters/Illinois. You can keep up on the Godfrey Hotel’s construction progress at http://buildingthegodfreyhotel.com.

Fred R. Beckmann, former AISC director of bridges, passed away last Friday, May 31, at the age of 82.

He was known as one of the nation’s most-recognized experts on steel bridge fabrication. In addition to his love of bridges, he especially enjoyed sharing his advice and wisdom.

“Fred’s passion was in the building of steel bridges and he developed an understanding of how steel girders behave as loading changes during construction,” said Bill McEleney, director of the National Steel Bridge Alliance. “His desire to share this knowledge will have a lasting effect on steel bridge design and construction in the future.”

Beckmann was born in Pekin, Ill., on July 25, 1930. He graduated from the University of Illinois in 1953 with a degree in civil engineering and in 1953 married Joanne Drake, also of Pekin, and they spent the majority of their life together in Chicago Heights, Ill. He was also an avid tennis player.

Beckmann started his career in Pennsylvania at Pittsburgh-Des Moines Steel and later moved back to Illinois to work in Springfield. The majority of his career was spent at Chicago Heights Steel. He joined AISC in 1980 as its director of bridges and retired 14 years later in 1994.

In 2002, he received an AISC Lifetime Achievement Award in special recognition of his many years of exceptional service to AISC and the structural steel design, construction and academic communities.

He is survived by his wife, Joanne, their three children and their families.

Funeral services will be conducted on Tuesday, June 4, at 11 a.m., with a 10 a.m. visitation prior to the service, at Trinity Lutheran Church, 2901 Western Avenue, Park Forest, Ill., 60466.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to either Trinity Lutheran Church (2901 Western Avenue, Park Forest, IL 60466) or to AISC (general scholarship fund in Fred Beckmann’s name). Checks should be made payable to AISC Education Foundation, Inc., and mailed to: AISC, Attn: Danielle Bronkema, One E. Wacker Drive, Suite 700, Chicago, IL 60601. Please note Fred Beckmann in the memo portion of the check.

Here’s MSC’s May Steel Structure Trivia question! The above is a flashback photo from the first-ever National Student Steel Bridge Competition (NSSBC), when Michigan State University hosted 13 teams. Things have come a long way in the competition since then (for instance, standing on the bridge is now against the rules!) but the level of action and excitement hasn’t changed a bit! Today and tomorrow, nearly 50 university teams will converge at the University of Washington in Seattle to compete in the 2013 NSSBC finals. Your trivia question is: What year did the NSSBC begin? Photo: Frank Hatfield

Answer:

The first NSSBC was held in 1992. Congratulations to our winners: Aaron Daley, a civil engineering student at the University of Kentucky; Ryan Couto, a structural engineer with Parsons Brinckerhoff, Boston; and Matthew Turner, a UC Davis alumnus who was the head advisor and designer on the university’s 2007 steel bridge team, nicknamed “Chrome Ollie,” which took second place overall that year.

Our trivia challenge was sort of a trick question. We had a few people respond to us with the year 1987, which is technically when it all started, but with a local competition. Bob Shaw, then AISC director of university programs, arranged a student steel bridge competition for three Michigan universities: Lawrence Technological University, Southfield, Mich.; Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Mich.; and Wayne State University, Detroit.

Over the next four years additional schools joined the Michigan competition, and other local competitions developed throughout the country. Each of the local competitions claimed to have the best bridges in the country. To settle the issue, in 1992 Michigan State challenged all bridge teams to the first national competition in East Lansing, Mich.

Fromy Rosenberg, AISC director of university programs from 1990 to 2008, provided organizational, moral and monetary support for the competition. Thirteen teams competed and Michigan State won.

To learn more about the history of the NSSBC, you can read an article from our July 2011 issue.

Last weekend, the student engineering team from the University of California, Berkeley, were named champions in this year’s NSSBC, held at the University of Washington in Seattle.

You can view photos from the competition on AISC’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/AISCdotORG in the “NSSBC 2013” photo album. More info on the results to come soon!