Design of Wood Beam-Columns with Spreadsheet - a PDH Online Course for Engineers, Architects and Surveyors

Design of Wood Beam-Columns with Spreadsheet

Course Outline

This course summarizes the major factors involved in the design of wood beam-columns. Included is an explanation of the use of an Excel© 2003 spreadsheet that can be used to design or evaluate the capacity of wood beam-columns. The use of the spreadsheet is illustrated with six examples.

This course includes a multiple choice quiz at the end, which is designed to enhance the understanding of the course materials.

Learning Objective

At the conclusion of this course, the student will:

Appreciate some of the complexities involved in the design of beam- columns.
Review some relevant physical properties of wood.
Gain understanding of which allowable stress adjustment factors apply to wood bending and wood compression.
Gain increased understanding of the use of the duration of load stress adjustment factor in wood structural design.
Learn how the beam stability factor is calculated and used.
Learn how the column stability factor is calculated and used.
Learn how wood stress adjustment factors are combined.
Review wood bending and compression formulas.
Gain understanding of the calculations used for beam-columns.
Understand how to use the provided spreadsheet to aid in the design and analysis of beam-columns.

Intended Audience

Structural Engineers, Architectural Engineers, Civil Engineers, and Architects.

Benefit to Attendee

The design of wood beam-columns is a necessary part of structural design but it is quite involved, and there is little prescriptive guidance available because of the countless possible combinations of bending and axial loads. The explanation given and the spreadsheet provided as part of the course allows the user to quickly design and analyze beam-columns for a variety of situations and conditions.

Course Content

The course content and the spreadsheet are in the following links:

Design of Wood Beam-Columns with Spreadsheet (Content PDF File 192 KB)

BEAMCOL© spreadsheet (Spreadsheet PDF File 13 KB. The actual Excel spreadsheet is needed to solve quiz problems and is available in the quiz)

You must have a licensed copy of Excel program to use this spreadsheet.

Analysis ToolPak needs to be installed before the Excel spreadsheet can function properly. To install the Analysis ToolPak:

1. Start Mircrosoft Excel spreadsheet program
2. On the Tools menu of Excel, click Add-Ins.
3. Select the Analysis ToolPak check box.
4. Click OK

This spreadsheet is provided for illustrative teaching purpose only, and is not intended for use in any specific project. Anyone making use of the information contained in this spreadsheet does so at his/her own risk and assumes any and all resulting liability arising therefrom.

You need to open or download above files to study this course.

You may need to download Acrobat Reader to view and print the document.

Table of Content

Introduction
Relevant Wood Properties
Allowable Stresses for Wood
Combining Factors
Members with Bending or Compression Only
Combined Bending and Compression
Using the Spreadsheet
Examples 1-6
References

Quiz

Once you finish studying the above course content, you need to take a quiz to obtain the PDH credits.

DISCLAIMER: The materials contained in the online course are not intended as a representation or warranty on the part of PDH Center or any other person/organization named herein. The materials are for general information only. They are not a substitute for competent professional advice. Application of this information to a specific project should be reviewed by a registered architect and/or professional engineer/surveyor. Anyone making use of the information set forth herein does so at their own risk and assumes any and all resulting liability arising therefrom.