Stair Designer Rus
Quite often, companies specializing in the see designs for projects which push the boundaries or physical capabilities of the machines. The reasons for this are varied. In some cases, the difficulties began back at the project design with an architect whose concept is something a bit unrealistic. Sometimes, a client has a request that might be feasible, but a change in material makes the job more difficult. Involving project managers with steel bending and rolling experience early on in the design process can help to navigate many of these issues before they become a problem.Looking at some initial concerns of what is realistic, we can examine some situations with rectangular tube stair stringers.
Stair Designer Rus 2017
There are two major issues that come up in the rolling of rectangular tube stringers. The first issue is often the size of stringer to be rolled. When rolling a stringer, concavity or deformation of the tube wall is a serious concern. The larger the hollow section of the stringer, the more difficult it can be to lessen that deformation. As well, the added size can pose problems with mechanical limitations of the rolling equipment. The machines which roll stringers helically are often not the same ones which roll the tubes when level.
As a result, the configuration of the helical rolling machines may be more suited to rolling smaller tubing, channels, or plates.Another concern when rolling stringers can be design changes and customer expectations. Design changes such as modifying material used from steel to aluminum for a stringer may seem minor in fabrication, but can have large impacts when rolling metal. The different chemical composition of aluminum means the material will have a different ‘window of opportunity’ than rolling carbon steel. What may be an acceptable pitch and radius for rolling a carbon steel channel stringer, may be too tight to roll in a similar sized aluminum channel stringer.
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The issue at hand is the amount of physical stress the machine needs to place on the material to reach a specific radius. The varying yield and tensile strengths between aluminum and carbon steel are such that, aluminum can reach a breaking point before steel when attempting to roll to tight radial dimensions. Discussed in a previous blog from last year, an Ohio state park committee was seeking for a monumental outdoor stairway. The problem the committee ran into was that the size tubing the design team had decided upon was not produced in the weathering steel which was an essential component of the design.
So the decision was made to construct the tube stringers out of 1/2 inch flat sections 4” and 19” in width to create the walls from readily available material. This would require care and precision by an experienced plate roller in order to insure each section of the built-up rectangular tube would match up to make both inside and outside tube stringers.The plate roll operators labeled each section in order to assist the fabricator with the assembly of the stringers. Once they arrived at the fabricator, the steel stringers would need to be assembled with slight variations in radius and pitch between the inside and outside tube walls.
Ensuring these were matched up properly with the pair of 4 inch wide flats to be welded would require a great deal of work. To assist in this, the fabricator installed spacers between the 19 inch walls to ensure a consistent hollow cavity space in the rectangular tube. Individually Labeled Steel Sections Spacers Inside the Rectangular Tube Hollow CavityIn the end, the fabrication of the helical tube stringer was only one portion of the complexities of this job. The pieces needed to be brought to the jobsite and installed in a location that you could certainly call out of the ordinary. As seen in the photos, the final installed staircase has become a beautiful addition, contrasting with the natural surroundings and leading visitors of the park up for a closer view of the nearby waterfalls.
The Grand Outdoor StaircaseThe end result, is that some jobs that may call for a helical tube stringer which is out of the ordinary, or perhaps beyond the capabilities for traditional rolling techniques. However locating a bender/roller with experience in constructing challenging helical staircases can offer alternatives that may be previously not considered, and result in an equally beautiful project utilizing rolled plate.
Many companies are finding new uses for the. Pipe and tubing can be extremely functional in applications which need a helical curve, though rolling pipe helically presents several challenges. Perhaps the most common example used in helical pipe jobs is when a designer calls for handrails on curved staircases. Very common in handrail jobs, bender/rollers will see call outs for 1 ½” schedule 40 pipe, or something very similar in size.Now, the initial challenge for rolling pipe in a helical fashion is the difference between the plan view dimension radius, and what would be the actual helical radius.
If you were to use the plan view, or ‘top-down’, radius and roll the handrails to those dimensions, you would most likely be left with a piece of material that is well out of tolerance for the project. The level radius, and pitched radius can vary a great deal when compared to each other.
Essentially, the pitched radius is running diagonally over a longer distance, increasing the radius. Unless you are correctly including the pitch into the rolling calculations, your end results will not match up with the expectations for your customer.In some cases, a ‘close-enough’ radius might work for a handrail over a shorter distance. If the radius is large enough, a level radius can be calculated which is functional. But other projects require a greater understanding of how to roll material in a true, helical manner.
In these situations, a skilled operator can make the necessary adjustments to keep the pipe rolled on a consistent radius. Even in situations where the pipe size is large or the radius is very tight.
One such recent example was involved a project of 6” pipe rolled helically to several different radial dimensions less than 36 inches, with varying pitch. Production staff would need to verify the dimensions of rolling consistently to ensure these stayed as close as possible. Helical PipeEven once all material is rolled and completed, there can still remain one often overlooked challenge involved in helical pipe bending. The necessities for shipping helical pipe require some forethought due to the awkward dimensions.
Helical pipe won’t always bundle as nicely as an item rolled flat and level. For this reason, helical rolling of structural shapes often involves scheduling shipping via flatbed versus loading into common carrier shipments. Unless the items are small enough to be boxed and placed on pallets, the items will often not store properly in the back of standard box trucks. Shipping Helical Pipe. A state park committee in Logan, Ohio, had a vision of a monumental tube-steel, circular stair way with an intermediate platform for viewing one of their many spectacular waterfalls.
They wanted to use self-weathering steel for its aesthetic and sustainable advantages over conventional A500 tubing.Unfortunately, a significant design oversight occurred when it was revealed during the bid process that mills do not produce a 20x4x1/2 structural tube in weathering A588 Corten material. Rather than reverting “back to the drawing board” and dragging the design team over the coals, the committee found a local, ornamental steel fabricator who alone was willing to take on the challenge. The fabricator’s solution was to pair up with a skilled bender/roller to fabricate from Corten plate four-piece, built-up to serve as the stair stringers.With the top and bottom, 4in flat section members identical, rolling these mill bars the hard-way (against the strong axis) helically to match the 19in side walls at a right angle was not easy. Highly skilled and trained machine operators took frequent measurements to insure a precise radius-to-pitch fit.To complete the next (2) members of this built-up tube and limited to 20 foot lengths, (8) 19in side walls were rolled to 4 individual, inside and outside radii, with (8) varying, rise/run pitch degrees. Separated by 3 inches, the inner wall will have a different radius and pitch from the outer wall to maintain a parallel rise.
Side Walls for Helical Stair StringerWith a jig-saw puzzle of loose, rolled, identified arc lengths and “miles” of welding and grinding ahead, the fabricator cut a series of steel spacers secured to the inner surfaces to maintain a consistent 19 x 3 cavity dimension. Corten Plate Rolled and Identified Steel Spacers Helped with the Fabrication Close Up of Stair Stringer of Built-Up, Helical Tube The Steel Fabricator Knew There Would be a Lot of Welding and GrindingProgress photos indicate the roller/bender supplier exercised their engineering talents to transform (4) plates into a single helical, steel stair stringer.The superior corrosive resistance of Corten over regular carbon steel will allow this self-weathering, curved staircase to naturally conform to the surrounding environment.
Furthermore, maintenance costs will be significantly reduced because the material does not need to be painted.Teaming up with the right fabricator and bender/roller can make an enormous difference when you’re building a challenging monumental, curved staircase.maxbutton id=”1″. Steel circular stairs (sometimes called “spiral stairs”) commonly incorporate “stringers,” structural members that support the treads, side walls (if any), and handrails.
These, channel, beam and tube (round, square and rectangular). These steel sections are most often curved into a helix but are sometimes formed into more complex compound bends.For example, some staircases require an elliptical shape. Others incorporate a narrowing or widening of the treads which changes the geometry of a simple helix. Some circular staircases have landings at the top and/or bottom of the stairs was well as in between. In every case, the accurate fabrication of the stringers is critical for the fit up of the staircase.Another type of stringer is the box plate stringer. Similar to how a built-up beam girder is comprised of three plates welded together to form the web and two flanges, so too a box plate stringer is comprised of four plates welded together. But here all 4 plates must be rolled into a helix.
And these plates have to match up perfectly to help create a staircase that is plumb and otherwise dimensionally accurate.If we think of the box stringer as it will be installed, we can refer to a top plate, a bottom plate, a plate on the inside radius, and a plate on the outside radius. The top and bottom plates could be called bar rings rolled the “hard way’ helically, i.e. A compound bend of a bar against the strong axis. The inside and outside bars could be called bar rings rolled the “easy way” helically, i.e.
A compound bend of a bar against the weak axis.Whatever these components are called, they have to fit together and work with the rest of the staircase parts.In the picture below you can see that the 1/2in beveled plates have been tack welded together indicating that they fit up together. To confirm accuracy in construction, there needs to be careful measuring of the radius, pitch, and orientation. In this case, the inside plate has an inside radius of 71.5in with a 27.83 degree pitch; the outside plate has an inside radius of 79in with a 25.85 degree pitch; the top and bottom plates are rolled the “hard way,” and are fit up to make a 16 x 8 box; lastly the orientation is “walk up, turn left.” Box Plate Stringer for Circular Stairs Plate Stringers with Straight Sections for Landings on Spiral Stairs.
Curved steel companies may receive the same requests for quotations, but their actual products may not be of the same quality.When purchasing straight steel, you largely know what to expect. There are standardized specifications and tolerances that steel mills have to meet in order to certify it. Straight steel is essentially a commodity.Curved steel, however, is a little different. Many applications are custom, and the tolerance requirements usually vary from job to job. Certain difficult jobs may be able to be done, but not to the same dimensional tolerance that an easier bending job would be. The quality you can expect largely depends on the shop that is making it.
For easier bending jobs, the difference in quality may be negligible. When purchasing very specialized curved steel like, going with an experience manufacturer who can provide a reliable part can often save your shop time and money as well as providing a better looking part.Below is a picture of rolled plate for a stair stringer. As you can see on the upper portion of the staircase, there are 3 weld seams and each piece is no longer than 4′.
This is a relatively easy staircase. (It’s a very slight radius, not difficult at all). It was obviously done by an inexperienced steel roller.By way of contract, below you can see a picture of for Drexel University. This is a much more difficult staircase where Chicago Metal Rolled Products rolled longer segments at a much more difficult pitch and radius. As you can see, a much better looking staircase was the result.
Circular Staircase by Chicago Metal Rolled Products. Although on a smaller scale than the devastation caused by the recent tornadoes in Oklahoma, in Greensburg, Kansas, on May 4, 2007, a tornado destroyed the Big Well Museum and Gift Shop as well as the nearby water tower. No longer could visitors descend the stairway 109ft into the cavern of the world’s largest hand-dug well.The new Big Well Museum re-opened on May 26, 2012 allowing visitors to once again descend in the Big Well but this time on a new spiral staircase. The museum features exhibits about the founding of Greensburg and the digging of the Big Well, the tornado that devastated Greensburg, and the rebuilding as a sustainable community.At its Kansas City, Missouri, plant, Chicago Metal Rolled Products for the spiral staircase and the surrounding round building. A sketch of the old stairway indicates that it was straight, not circular.
And that the building above ground was nothing special. Sketch of the Old Stairway at Big WellThe new circular staircase is elegant both above and below ground. And the new building is impressive. New Circular Stairway at Big Well New Big Well Museum with Above-Ground Spiral StairsThe history of the Big Well begins in the 1880’s when the construction of railroad lines being built nearby required a reliable water source. Crews of 12 to 15 men hand-dug the well from sun up to sun down.
Bricks were brought to the site by special wagons that in turn carried the dirt away. Slats in the wagons could open to discharge the dirt and level the roads that were being used.During the digging, two-by-twelve planks arranged like a wagon wheel were used as horizontal bracing every 12ft across the 32ft diameter shaft. The workers could then safely shovel dirt into barrels that were hoisted to the surface.
Once the brickwork was completed, the bracing was removed.At the desired depth, many pieces of perforated pipe were driven into the gravel outside the side walls to facilitate the flow of water into the reservoir at the bottom of the well.Over three million visitors from every state in the nation and many foreign countries have visited Big Well.
Staircon Online Designer – Design your stair on the web Always open to visitorsWith Staircon Online Designer your customers can design their stair on the web, choosing from your range of stair styles. Measurement of floor height and staircase can easily be adjusted. The visitor can pan, zoom and rotate the stair and try out different design options such as material and finish. A number of predefined stair geometries are generated using the Staircon database. Used in combination with the add-on module Pricing, there is an option to display the price of the stair.The web-browser needs to have support for webGL.