ProSteel 2012 changes

Release 5.42g: 23 Dec 2012

• Program could hang on trying to edit a beam with a splice - fixed
• A note is added to steel beam calculations where the beam comprises two or three sections and no other notes have been added. The note reads 'Sections to be bolted together with tube spacers or suitable alternative connections at max 1.5m c/s'. This is a one-off procedure: the standard text will not be reinserted if you delete or edit it.
• Beam end plate splice corrections:
  • The value of m and alpha in end plate splice calculations were calculated using an assumed web and flange weld sizes of 8mm. These have been corrected so as to use the actual assumed weld sizes (=(web/flange thickness/0.7)/2 rounded up). For weld sizes other than 8mm the new splice moment capacities will be slightly different to those returned by 5.40a-5.42f. The assumed weld sizes are now explicitly shown on the calculation sheet
  • The L_eff value for bolt groups where the lowest pair of bolts is not the bottom pair (e.g. capacity of rows 2 + 3 [1=bottom pair) was, in some cases, incorrectly calculated. For the bottom row L_eff component we used P207 Table 2.6 Bolt row of a group [above] the beam flange of a flush end plate instead of Top or bottom row of a group along a clear length. In many cases the two return the same value; where there is a difference it is small (max difference 2.π.m v. 4m+1.25e) and unlikely to be critical.
• If you selected 'Usual user' in the User Initials dialog your initials were printed with a question mark in front of them - fixed

Release 5.42f: 26 Nov 2012

• Internal PDF generation now uses a different code library (QuickPDF).
• Bug fixed which allowed beam load edit page splitter bar to be moved so as to obscure load table
• Bug fixed which stopped the first item in the Project Manager list being copied and pasted
• BM and SF line thicknesses in beam BM/SF diagrams are now separately definable for the current printer and for internally generated PDFs
• Effective lengths: if you enter an actual length 'm.' is now added to make it clear that this is a physical length, not a factor
• Sundry small improvements to user interface and printouts

Release 5.42e: 1 Nov 2012

Fixes a bug introduced into 5.42d that set some spin edit values to zero and stopped them being changed

Release 5.42d: 24 Oct 2012

• Improved printing options: The Print dialog now lets you select the printer (if more than one installed) from a drop-down list. On the PDF page checking a box displays a PDF Settings dialog in which you can optionally select PDF files whose content will be merged before/after the ProSteel-generated content.
• New Miscellaneous, Merge PDFs option: This lets you combine a number of PDF files into one file.

Release 5.42c: 23 Sep 2012

There is no 5.42b

• You can now add notes to appear at the end of the basic beam calculation (i.e. before the steel calculation). This will be extended to EuroBeam-style scripting in due course.
• Site licence users only: On request we can now send you a licence key file which if copied to the same folder as the program executable removes the need to enter activation keys on client machines.
• This release incorporates a number of user interface enhancements, including additional colour choices.
• Changed calculator VAT rate wasn't saved (to change the VAT rate to [say] 20% enter ++0.20 and press enter)

Release 5.42a: 13 Jun 2012

• The 0.01 version number change is because this release is built with Delphi XE2 - this is a technical change that does not affect end users
• The only other small change is that the sources of all the equations used in the steel beam LTB calculation are now shown

Release 5.41j: 22 Apr 2012

Three small changes:

1. The steel beam calculation is now broken up by a number of subheads (note that the font used for these is set in Configuration, Screen and Printer Fonts
2. An addition checkbox on the Beam Edit, Steel page Show pb calculation determines whether the way in which the buckling stress is calculated is shown in detail or not.

Release 5.41i: 8 Mar 2012

1. On the Bearings page of the Beam Edit dialog if the bearing type was none and you pressed the full editor button you could add bearing notes but these were not printed and lost on saving. Now if you do this, the bearing type is automatically changed to User Defined and the notes are handled correctly.
2. If you entered the permissible beam deflection using a lower case 'l' you would get repeated error messages - fixed
3. Until now all PDF files produced by ProSteel's inbuilt PDF generator have been secure, i.e. they could not be modified. This protection is now optional.

Release 5.41h: 6 Feb 2012

1. Wrong time was printed on page heading if hour < 10
2. Where one beam bearing type was 'None', the Summary omitted it; it now says 'Not specified'
3. Where both beam bearings were identical, the Summary omitted R2; it now says 'As R1'
4. Help, About now includes an additional section that explains the link between activation keys and update availability