At PES Structural Engineers, we have extensive experience collaborating with numerous architecture firms and school systems on successful K-12 projects. We have helped school districts handle increased student growth by designing new schools, as well as adding, renovating and replacing existing structures. We understand the budget and time constraints that these clients face and the […]
Air Content in Concrete ACI 301 – Specifications for Structural Concrete currently limits the air content in concrete slabs that are to receive a hard trowel finish to 3%. There is no magic to this value other than it has historically worked well to limit the probability of surface imperfections, such as delimitation, that can […]
This year John O’Brien, P.E., S.E., Sarah Scarborough, P.E., and I had the opportunity to attend the NCSEA Structural Engineering Summit in Washington, D.C. The sessions were informative and sparked thought-provoking conversations amongst the diverse group of engineers that were in attendance. We compiled a list of our favorite takeaways from the conference. Enjoy! 1.Whenever […]
On October 5th and 6th I had the opportunity to get back on the campus of my Alma Mater to attend some of the 2017 Georgia Tech Digital Building Laboratory Symposium. This is an interesting event focused on entrepreneurship and some of the research that is going on with Georgia Tech’s Digital Building Laboratory. There […]
At the beginning of September, we were wondering if there was going to be a Tilt-up Concrete Convention this year as Irma set her sights on Miami and the southern tip of Florida. As fair winds helped push her farther west than expected, specifically over to the Florida Keys where she did her damage; this […]
We’ve all been there. We have to create our plans but our floorplan in our working view is too large at the desired scale for a sheet. The most common solution is to break the floorplan up into multiple views or plans. Of course, there is more than one way to accomplish this break-up. You can […]
On Thursday, May 11, I had the opportunity to speak to the 3rd grade students at Dresden Elementary School for Career Day. Explaining structural engineering can be a challenge when my friends and family ask me about my career, so the task of explaining my career to a group of elementary schools students was initially […]
Our last post on the PES BIM Guiding Principles discusses one of the most valuable aspects of the BIM process: leveraging data. While adding value to the design team, modeling as it will be constructed and modeling to accommodate change swiftly are all deeply valuable for us and our clients, the fourth principle, leveraging data […]
We’ve come to the third installment of our four-part series exploring the PES BIM guiding principles. We’ve already covered adding value to the design team and model as it will be constructed. We try to add value to the design team by being excellent communicators and experts in BIM tools and processes. You can read […]
We’re constantly working to improve our BIM processes and Revit models. We never sit still and part of that process is updating our families. The actual updates are handled by our Power User Group (PUG) but our entire production team needs to be familiar with updating the revised families at their individual workstations. Lost? Let’s […]