Arch Structure

Description
This tool allows you to build structural elements such as columns or beams, by specifying their width, length and height, or by basing them on a 2D profile (face, wire or sketch).

Additionally, a certain number of presets available during object creation, allow you to quickly build a structural element from a predefined standard profile.



How to use

 * 1) Select a 2D shape (draft object, face or sketch) (optional).
 * 2) Press the  button, or press  then  keys.
 * 3) Adjust the desired properties.

Options

 * Structural elements share the common properties and behaviours of all Arch Components
 * If no object is selected, a default 3-dimension block is created
 * The height, width and length of a structure can be adjusted after creation
 * Press or the  button to abort the current command.
 * Double-clicking on the structure in the tree view after it is created allows you to enter edit mode and access and modify its additions and subtractions
 * In edit mode, it is also possible to add axes systems to the structural element. When adding one axes system, the structural element will be copied once on each axis of the system. When adding two axes systems, the structural element will be copied once on each intersection of the two systems.

Properties

 * : The length of the structure (only used if not based on a profile)
 * : The width of the structure (only used if not based on a profile)
 * : The height of the structure (or the extrusion length when based on a profile). If no height is given, and the structure is inside a floor object with its height defined, the structure will automatically take the value of the floor height.
 * : An optional offset between the centerline and the nodes line
 * : The type of structural nodes of this object, linear or area.
 * : Shows or hides the structural nodes.

Presets
The Structure tool also features a series of presets that allow to quickly build standard metallic profiles or precast concrete elements.



The presets are obtained by choosing a Category from the structure options panel. Available categories are Precast concrete or any of the industry-standard metallic profiles such as HEA, HEB or INP. For each of these categories, a number of presets are available. Once a preset is chosen, its individual parameters such as Length, Width or Height can be adjusted. However, for metallic profiles, the profile size is set by the preset and cannot be changed.

The Switch L/H button can be used to switch Length and Height values, and therefore building a horizontal beam rather than a vertical column.



Structural nodes
Structural objects also have the ability to display structural nodes. Structural nodes are a sequence of 3D points stored in a "Nodes" property. By switching the "Show Nodes" view property on/off, one can see the structural nodes of a structural element:




 * Nodes are calculated and updated automatically, as long as you don't modify them manually. If you did, they won't be updated if the shape of the structural object changes, unless you use the "Reset nodes" tool below.
 * Arch structures can have not only linear nodes, but also planar nodes. For this, 1- There must be at least 3 vectors in the "Nodes" property of the object, 2- the "NodesType" property of their ViewObject must be set to "Area".
 * When the nodes calculation is automatic (that is, if you never touched them manually), when setting the Role property of a structure to "Slab", it will automatically become a planar node (there will be more than 3 vectors and the NodesType will be set to "Area").
 * When editing a structure object (double-click), a couple of node tools are available in the task view:
 * Reset the nodes to automatic calculation, in case you modified them manually
 * Edit the nodes graphically, works the same way as Draft Edit
 * Extend the nodes of the edited object until it touches the node of another object
 * Make the node of this object and another one coincident
 * Toggle the display of all nodes of all structural objects of the document on/off

Scripting
Arch API and FreeCAD Scripting Basics.

The Structure tool can be used in macros and from the Python console by using the following function:


 * creates a structure element based on the given profile object and the given extrusion height. If no base object is given, you can also specify length and width for a cubic object.

Example: