BIM-based Compliant Design of Composite Structures Under Severe Fire Conditions

Since the early nineties, there have been major studies carried out to learn the behaviour and performance of composite structures exposed to fire. It is essential that structural members maintain their integrity and load... [ view full abstract ]

Since the early nineties, there have been major studies carried out to learn the behaviour and performance of composite structures exposed to fire. It is essential that structural members maintain their integrity and load bearing capacity under elevated temperature for an adequate duration to allow building occupants to escape and for any firefighting and rescue operation to take place safely. The recently published joint Australia/New Zealand Standard 2327:2017 incorporates a major section on the design and analysis of two-way composite steel-concrete floor systems for fire resistance. The input parameters required for the calculations include the building geometry and fenestration, design loading, and details of structural members. Conventionally, collating the data is a laborious, inefficient, and error-prone data gathering process that is undertaken manually from drawings and other paper-based documentation prior to the actual analysis. 

The uptake of ISO standard BIM (Building Information Modelling) has gained a rapid momentum in the industry in recent years. This means more and more architectural and engineering design information will become accessible for sharing with downstream design and analysis applications. This paper investigates what type of information is available from BIM that can be transferred to dedicated software tools for the analysis of composite structures. Additionally, the paper describes the potential application of an open standard legal knowledge model for sharing design parameters prescribed by normative standards. A worked example has been selected to illustrate the data exchange requirements and highlight challenges.