In Advance Concrete, material quantity estimation (cubic meters for concrete volume and square meters for formwork surface) is feasible for one or several structural elements included in a project.
Starting with Advance Concrete 2012, these quantities can be calculated by taking the structural openings into consideration. The main advantage of this option is precise calculation for the material quantities, regardless of the shape of the opening and the possibility to condition the estimation depending on the value of the volume/surface.
Creation and customization of a bill of materials for the structure is available by accessing the “BOM” command from the “AC: Drawing” ribbon, on the “Publish” tab:
First, the user must select the elements to include in the list:
• All structural elements in the current level – by activation of the level in the Pilot and manual or automatic selection (keyboard combination "Ctrl + A") of all elements;
• All elements in the structure – by activation of the building in the Pilot and manual or automatic selection (keyboard combination "Ctrl + A") of all elements
Next, a properties window appears and various changes for currency, document path and display can be made. After finalizing the command, the bill of materials is generated as a Microsoft Word document.
If structural elements contain openings (windows, doors, installation openings etc.), these can be considered or ignored in the quantities generated in the bill of materials.
This customization can be accomplished by accessing the “Openings calculation rules” tab, which is available in the list's properties window opened after command activation and element selection:
In the automatically opened window, the calculation rules are organized as a table, depending on the type of structural element. There are separate columns for volume and formwork surface calculation. Every table cell contains a check box and an empty field where numerical values can be entered.
The user has various possibilities for managing the opening's contribution in the bill's quantities, as indicated in the explanatory notes displayed at the bottom of the window:• All openings in the selected elements can be taken into consideration - for volume calculation, for surface calculation or for both of them.
• The considered openings will be the ones with surface and volume bigger than a custom value, entered by the user in the corresponding cell.
For example, a wall has the following dimensions:
- Length L=2.10 m
- Height h=3.00 m
- Thickness b=0.20 m
In the wall there is a circular window of diameter D=1.05 m.
The wall surface is
S = h x L = 3.00 x 2.10 m = 6.30 m2
The wall volume is
S x b = 6.30 x 0.20 = 1.26 m3
The window surface is
S = π x 1.052 / 4 = 0.86 m2
The window volume is
S x b = 0.86 x 0.20 = 0.17 m3
A structural bill of material is required for this wall, and openings are not to be considered. In order to obtain it, none of the corresponding checkboxes must be checked:
If a more exact calculation is required, the openings of any dimensions can be extracted from the wall volume and surface. The table checkboxes on both columns are checked, for wall type elements and the resulted quantities are as follows:
When custom minimum values for volume and surface are entered in the regulations table, the window dimensions are compared to these values. For example, if the chosen dimensions are 0.10 m3 for volume and 0.50 m2 for surface, the circular window is bigger than this and it will be subtracted from the wall quantities:
If the entered values are bigger than the ones of the existing circular window, for example 0.20 m3 for volume and 1.00 m2 for surface, the window will not be considered for the quantities calculation:
There is also the possibility to only subtract the window from the wall in the calculation of one of the parameters, while for the other one, the window is ignored. For example, the window volume will be taken into consideration, but for the wall surface, the window will be discarded:
