Year: 2012

By Terry Smith, Technical Marketing Director, Hot Dip Galvanizers Association Southern Africa It should be reasonably common knowledge that to achieve a good quality hot dip galvanized coating thickness in terms of SANS121 of a minimum mean of about 85 microns on structural steel, the silicon content of the steel should be limited to the […]

By Spencer Erling, Education Director, SAISC What a month May was for visiting American experts to visit South Africa to share their knowledge with us. Firstly there was Don Allen who came to talk about multistory light steel framed construction (see article on page 18) and then we were lucky enough to have Robert (Bob) […]

By Amanuel Gebremeskel, Development Engineer, SAISC Stability is one of those topics in structural engineering that most of us would rather avoid. There are at least two reasons for this. One is that it requires solving differential equations. The second is that even if one knows how to solve eigenproblems, real structures are simply too […]

The SAISC would like to challenge anyone who has novel ideas about how to create new buildings to come forward. We promise to use our resources to help realise viable dreams where there is a role for steel. The invitation is for people from all walks of life since novel ideas can involve any aspect […]

AN UPDATE ON THE PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED ARTICLE (Steel Construction March 2010) By Franco P. Mordini, Robor Market Development Engineer and Chairman of the Technical Committee of the Association of Steel Tube and Pipe Manufacturers of South Africa Grade 355 tubes, also commonly known as structural hollow sections, was officially launched in February 2010 in Cape […]

By Spencer Erling, Education Director, SAISC BACKGROUND AND LEGAL REQUIREMENTS Engineers should be aware of the legal requirement contained in the Occupational Health and Safety Act 1993 and subsequent amendment GNR.1010 of 18 July 2003: Construction Regulations, 2003 which states in Chapter 9’s subclauses: “(4) Any owner of a structure shall ensure that inspections of […]

By Spencer Erling, Education Director, SAISC It is common knowledge that from time to time (in fact quite rarely) steel plates thicker than 20mm suffer from a problem called laminations. What is a lamination and/or lamellar tear? Laminations (strictly speaking they should be called centre line laminations) constitute a phenomenon that occurs in the continuous […]