Structural Detailing R&D

Structural Detailing R & D

DGS has evolved into an eminent organization with enhanced automation support for carrying out manual/mundane activities in day to day modeling/checking/production of shop drawings. To accomplish this we use state-of-the-art Application Programming Interfaces, Plugins using Microsoft.net, C#, DotNet Frameworks, ASP.Net, Java, VBA.

Automation team under our R and D department has developed extensive work on various 3D Modeling platforms for Tekla, SDS 2 and AutoCAD. These automations have been used by our Production teams to eliminate repetitive human interventions and day to day mundane work. This has given high returns in the form of Productivity/Accuracy and uniformity of our deliverables for various Sequences/Lots. Stringent Production timelines have been able to accomplish by using these in-house Automation programs.

We also emphasize on standardizing and centralizing all the model related settings for different customers to have the uniform output of the projects that are executed in different office locations of DGS, also we continuously actuate on improvising the settings and APIs to satisfy the repeating orders with less hassle.

A few of the customization which we had achieved with our R&D team:

Drawing Logs & Transmittals: Many tools has been developed to generate drawing logs and tracking as per client’s format, this will save a lot of time especially when the volume of drawings are huge.
Multi Linking: A special tool has been developed where the assembly drawings are automatically linked to Multi drawings based on the geometry and complexity of assembly. This activity is one of the most time-consuming in detailing which has been eased up by our tool; it only takes a few minutes to link. It will even generate multi drawings and Gather sheets for single parts.
Standard PL width: This tool will check all the plates in model for the standard flat bar width as per the client’s available widths. It also gives the possibility if the plates can be reduced / increased to match the standard width in possible areas. It helps in reducing the wastage of materials.
Bolt checking Tools: some of the tools that check the bolt projection, insufficient bolt lengths, bolt edge distance (AISC) and any bolt errors have helped us reduce lot of checking time and improve quality.
Editing Tools: Tools such as identifying missing assembly marks in GA drawings, providing shear plate location in GA drawings has helped us reduce editing time and provide error free E-Plans.
Special Tools: Some of the special tools such as Numbering of bolts and welds have played a very important role in modeling where client requires a unique number for bolts and welds.

Checking Tools: Checking aspects such as clip corners in shear / stiffener plates and stick-in / stick-out of stiffener plates where it is a specific standard has been achieved by our automation tools.
Deliverables: Deliverables such as KISS, Fabtrol and NC files are been modified / altered with our tools to suit client’s requirement which cannot be done in Tekla software.
Bolt Reports: Reports such as Point To Point and Summary are generated by the tools based on the client’s format for a single sequence or entire model, the quantity of bolts in report is accurate and there is no mismatch.
Modeling Tools: Connections in the model are tailored to read from excel file and apply the parameters, these includes Tekla macros and custom components this gives us the correct parameters and the errors are minimal.
Special extensions such as Safety Cable Holes, Erection Tie off holes, beam locator holes, Lifting holes / lugs, kicker brace connections are all developed in-house based on client’s requirements.
Tabulated Gather Sheets: A special tool has been developed to tabulate all the similar parts and add a relevant sketch in the multi drawing with this table. This will reduce the number of Gather sheets from 100 to 10 which result in less checking, less detailing works.

Apart from all the automation, we do have a firm setup to take care of all the pre-requisites of drawing presentations and all the layouts, templates are stored in a central library.

Also we develop many custom components instantly as we come across the requirements in the modeling stage.