20 minute read
Great Achievements
William J. Mouton
Tube Structure Pioneer and Foundation Innovator
By Richard G. Weingardt, P.E., S.E., Dist.M.ASCE, F.ACEC
In addition to his many breakthrough structural innovations, noted New Orleans structural engineer and Tulane University professor of architecture, William J. (“Bill”) Mouton, Jr. (Figure 1) also stood out for an incredible list of other accomplishments. He held more than 20 patents, including erosion control concepts for Louisiana’s wetlands, regeneration systems for rebuilding sand beaches, a unique monotrack system for high-speed mass transit, and a counter-rotating combustion engine. Mouton designed an amphibian aircraft, a single engine short takeoff and landing aircraft with “swing wings,” and his patented “Coriolis” ocean turbine unit was featured on the cover of Popular Science (September 1980). That federally funded research project extracted energy from ocean currents deep below the surface. Mouton was internationally recognized as a pioneer in the design and erection of innovative long-span steel space-frame structures and tubular (“monocoque”)
Figure 2: Plaza Tower, New Orleans. Courtesy of Mary Mouton. systems for high-rises, as well as modular prestressed concrete buildings. He was involved with more than 500 noteworthy projects, ranging from the American Sugar Dome in Boston, Massachusetts, the world’s largest parabolic dome at the time of its construction, to the Plaza Towers (Figure 2), for years the tallest building in New Orleans at 531 feet. Both projects, along with Studio Arms, a glass-roof space-frame covering more than an acre, were featured in a Museum of Modern Art exhibit on 20 th Century Engineering in New York City in the 1960s. On a visit shortly after it opened, Robert Disque, chief engineer with the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC), recalled, “While I was visiting the Modern Museum, I was amazed to see an exhibit featuring a structural engineer. He was from New Orleans and someone I had never heard of before. There was a photo of a high-rise building, which the museum touted as unusual and beautiful. I saw immediately what the structure was. The frame was like a milk carton. Nothing liked it had ever been done. Instead of beams, girders and columns, it was designed as a tube.” Because he had never heard of such a thing at the time, Disque made an appointment to visit Mouton in New Orleans. When he got there, he said, “I had trouble finding him. His office was in the boondocks. His system came to be referred to as a monocoque or tubular structural system. I visited with him and put him on the next AISC program, which may have been 1965 or 1966.” At the AISC event, Mouton gave a comprehensive and in-depth presentation delineating the pros and cons of tube design for high-rise steel structures. In addition to using it for the Plaza Tower Building, Mouton also employed a unique deep pile foundation system that he had developed for supporting multi-story structures. (The pile testing for Plaza Towers is shown in Figure 3.) Prior to the Plaza project, constructed in the early 1960s, buildings in New Orleans were limited to fewer than 31 stories. Mouton’s deep pile system changed all that. Ron Flucker was with American Bridge, which was part of US Steel at the time, and was erecting Plaza
Figure 1: William J. Mouton, Jr. Courtesy of Mary Mouton.
Tower. He got to know Mouton very well because of all the structural innovations that Mouton had incorporated into the building. Said Flucker, “He was the brightest structural engineer I ever met.” Mouton liked to tell his students and followers, “Always go beyond the book.” On a regular basis he told them, “The structural engineer should approach his problems as a creative visualist, not as a mere stress analyst. He should first think in three-dimensional terms, of transferring loads through space. Students of structure should first learn to visualize the action of structures, and then learn the mathematical intricacies of analysis. An overemphasis on analysis stunts the growth of the structural engineer’s imagination. Focusing his early professional gaze on the microscopic view of a twig (e.g., the analysis of an eccentrically loaded rivet connection), when he should first survey the whole tree (the basic structural system), should be avoided.” The Plaza’s steel superstructure was the first – or at least, one of the first – designed as a tube frame to resist lateral loads. The earliest known example of the use of a tube system for a skyscraper was the concrete-framed, 43-story DeWitt-Chestnut Apartment Building in Chicago designed by the legendary Fazlur Khan. However, Khan’s first structural steel tube skyscraper, the John Hancock Center in Chicago, was designed in 1965 and completed in 1969, a few years after Mouton’s Plaza Tower. In 1965, Mouton proposed a glass-paneled dome over Shea Stadium in New York. Its
silhouette looked like a fl ying saucer. Th e New Orleans Times-Picayune (June 6, 1965) reported, “Houston’s Astrodome could be fi tted inside it.” Th e Shea project, alas, was never built. However, a few of Mouton’s other glass-roofed enclosures were, such as the Studio Arms structure, the patio roof of the Camillo Restaurant, and a large apartment-house courtyard. Th ese came well before Buckminster Fuller’s famous 250-foot geodesic dome, featuring transparent acrylic panels and steel latticework, which served as an architectural centerpiece at the 1967 International and Universal Exposition in Montreal, Canada. Mouton’s largest completed dome, the Cajundome (Figures 4 and 5) in Lafayette, Louisiana, opened in 1984, had a clear span of 384 feet and was included, with many of his other works, as part of the Engineers of the Century exhibit at the Georges Pompidou Center in Paris in 1997. Th e exhibit also featured Mouton himself. In addition to innovative new construction, Mouton worked on structural renovations of numerous historic buildings, including the Federal Fibre Mills, Woodward Wright Apartments, and Henderson apartments, all in the New Orleans area. Bill’s younger brother Paul became an architect, and the
Figure 3: Pile testing for the Plaza Tower was pushed all the way to 462 tons without failure, well in excess of the required 180-ton design load. Courtesy of Mary Mouton.
ADVERTISEMENT–For Advertiser Information, visit www.STRUCTUREmag.org
Structural Software Designed for Your Success
Easy to Learn and Use Analyze “Just about Anything!” Design: Steel, Wood, Concrete, Aluminum, and Cold-Formed
www.iesweb.com
Free 30-Day Trial
IES, Inc. | 519 E Babcock St. Bozeman MT 59715 800-707-0816 | info@iesweb.com
two shared office space, often collaborating on projects. Individually and between them, they successfully completed a record number of low-cost and aesthetically appealing structures, including Mouton’s own home, a timber engineering masterpiece whose floors were raised above the New Orleans flood plain. It featured thick decking for its floors and roof, and 4-inch x 6-inch columns to allow for maximun clear spans. Bill was born in Lafayette, Louisiana in 1931, the oldest of four children. While he was growing up, he worked for his father, William Sr., who was a partner in the construction company, J.B. Mouton & Sons, founded in 1915 by his father (Bill’s grandfather). Bill’s clan of Moutons settled in southern Louisiana in the 18th century, after the British expelled Arcadia French colonists from Newfoundland. J.B. began the Mouton construction company with teams of mules digging excavations for houses, and then moved into increasingly larger commercial projects. The company still exists. As a boy, Bill was fascinated with scale model airplanes – designing, building and flying them. He even enlisted the help of his two younger sisters, Julie and Christine, to help him cut the balsa wood to make the models, some with 6-foot wingspans. Reported his oldest son, Dave, “Dad would work at odd jobs and, when he earned sufficient funds, he would rush down to the hobby store to purchase the latest balsa kit model. He would then lock the door to his bedroom and not come out until the plane was finished. This greatly concerned my grandmother as he wouldn’t eat, drink or go to the bathroom for hours on end.”
Figure 4: Cajundome, Lafayette. Courtesy of Wikimedia/Jcarriere.
Bill attended Tulane University on a ROTC scholarship and ended up assigned to Bermuda where he flew patrol seaplanes for the U.S. Navy in the 1950s. He carried his love of flying into civilian life when he became an enthusiast of soaring (or gliding) in non-motorized airplanes. He was one of the first active glider pilots in Louisiana and was the author of a number of seminal articles on the subject. Mouton earned a bachelor’s degree from Tulane in 1953 and a master’s degree in 1958, both in civil engineering. Shortly after marrying Elizabeth (“Libby”), who grew up around the corner from Bill, Mouton was offered a job with Martin Aircraft in Baltimore, Maryland, which would have required them to move there. According to their daughter, Mary, “He turned it down, saying, ‘What’s a Cajun going to do in Baltimore?’” Bill and Mary had five children: David, a petroleum engineer; Stephanie, a physician; Martin, an engineering draftsman; Mary, a public relations consultant; and Robert, a real estate attorney Said Mary, “After building the Plaza Tower, my father treated himself to a Porsche 911, one of the very first in New Orleans. They were much, much cheaper then. In the early days, he always had little kids in tow, riding around in that Porsche with music blaring in his 8-track stereo. He came from a musical family, where mostly everyone played the piano. His favorite song that he played was ‘Night and Day’ by Cole Porter. That’s the only song I ever remember him playing. He also entertained us as little kids by playing the ukulele.” “On weekends, our father would take us to his office on Saturday mornings and then it was off to various airports where he flew his glider ‘NSOAR’ (actual tail number was N-8OAR). My father was one of the first glider pilots in the area and all of his recreation, and consequently much of our family’s, centered around gliding. We took vacations to California where the kids went to Disneyland and my father, ever the engineer, went to a glider port. NSOAR was a ‘self-launching’ sailplane. It would propel itself into the air, without the need of a tow from an airplane, which is more conventional.” At the time of his passing on June 30, 2001, at age 70, a victim of cancer, Mouton was no longer a full-time professor at Tulane. He was employed as chief engineer for Coastal Engineering and Environmental Consultants and was involved with the design of several B-2 stealth bomber hangars for the U.S. Air Force. Mouton was survived by his wife and their five children and their families.▪
Richard G. Weingardt, P.E., S.E. (rweingardt@weingardt.com), is the Chairman of Richard Weingardt Consultants, Inc. in Denver, Colorado and the author of ten books. Two of his latest, Circles in the Sky: The Life and Times of George Ferris and Engineering Legends, both published by ASCE Press, feature the exploits of great American structural engineers who had significant influence on the progress of the nation. His 2012 book, Empire Man, is about Homer Balcom, structural engineer for the Empire State Building.
Steel/Cold-Formed Steel ProduCtS Guide
a definitive listing of steel/cold-formed steel product manufacturers/distributors and their product lines
Suppliers
Cast Connex Corporation
Phone: 416-806-3521 Email: info@castconnex.com Web: www.castconnex.com Product: Cast ConneX Universal Pin Connectors Description: Sleek, clevis-type fittings designed to connect seamlessly to round hollow structural section elements for use in architecturally exposed structural applications. The connectors have been carefully sculpted to provide smooth transitional geometry that is otherwise unachievable using standard fabrication practices.
CMC Steel Products
Phone: 972-772-0769 Email: marketing@cmc.com Web: www.cmcsteelproducts.com Product: SMARTBEAM®, Castellated and Cellular Beams Description: CMC Steel Products manufactures the cellular and castellated SMARTBEAM – an innovative, economical and sustainable alternative for floor and roof framing systems. Manufactured from recycled materials, the beams are lightweight, have superior deflection properties, and can integrate MEP systems through the web openings. SMARTBEAM – The Intelligent Alternative.
Evolution1
Phone: 206-455-1978 Email: duane@envirobeam.com Web: www.envirobeam.com Product: Envirobeam Description: Green Pre-insulated CFS building components for exterior walls. Pre-insulated envirobeam perimeter roof curbs.
GT STRUDL
Phone: 404-894-2260 Email: case@ce.gatech.edu Web: www.gtstrudl.gatech.edu Product: GTSTRUDL Description: GTSTRUDL for the analysis & design of civil works facilities, industrial, nuclear, offshore, transportation, and utilities. Key analysis features include linear/nonlinear static, dynamic, pushover, and buckling analysis. US and International Steel Design Codes plus ACI and British Concrete Design Codes. Optional modules for Base Plate Analysis and Multi-Processor Solvers are available.
Hardy Frames, Inc.
Phone: 800-754-3030 Email: dlopp@mii.com Web: www.hardyframe.com Product: Hardy Frame® Panels, Brace Frames and Special Moment Frames Description: HFX-Series Panels and Brace Frames are fabricated with galvanized Cold Formed Steel to standard wood stud heights; HFX/S-Series to standard steel stud heights. Custom heights are also available. Our Special Moment Frame is a structural steel product that uses SidePlate® moment connections.
New Millennium Building Systems
Phone: 260-868-6000 Email: kevin.disinger@newmill.com Web: www.newmill.com Product: Steel joist, metal decking and castellated beams Description: New Millennium, a leader in BIM-based steel joist design, engineers and manufactures standard steel joist, architecturally unique steel joists, steel decking and FreeSpan castellated and cellular beams for wide-open bay designs. Has also introduced the Flex-Joist Gravity Overload Safety System for early warning of roof overloads.
S-FRAME Software, Inc.
Phone: 203-421-4800 Email: info@s-frame.com Web: www.s-frame.com Product: S-PAD Description: An entry-level, easy-to-use, stand-alone steel-member design and optimization application for small consulting engineering firms. Easy to use spreadsheet-type interface with advanced codechecking capabilities and auto-design to multiple design codes (AISC, CSA, EC, BS) for both strength and serviceability of columns, beams, and braces. Fully supports all of S-STEEL DESIGN checks.
Simpson Strong-Tie
Phone: 925-560-9000 Email: web@strongtie.com Web: www.strongtie.com Product: Simpson Strong-Tie SUBH Bridging Connector Description: The latest innovation from Simpson StrongTie for CFS framing. SUBH can reduce labor costs and increase installation productivity, with installation by a single installer and many applications requiring one screw. SUBH has been tested to include stud-web strength and stiffness in tabulated design values. Product: Simpson Strong-Tie DBC Drywall Bridging Connector Description: The DBC drywall bridging connector includes patent-pending design enabling one- or two-screw installation, significantly reducing labor and material costs. DBC is the first and only connector loadrated for smaller ¾-inch u-channel bridging. Extensively lab-tested as a system, ensuring that tabulated design values reflect stud web depth and thickness.
Technical Glass Products
Phone: 800-426-0279 Email: sales@fireglass.com Web: www.tgpamerica.com Product: SteelBuilt Curtainwall® Systems Description: Stronger and slimmer than traditional aluminum frames, SteelBuilt Curtainwall Systems enable openings with larger areas of glass, smaller frame profiles and greater free spans. Usable with almost any type of structural member as a back mullion, SteelBuilt Curtainwall Systems can satisfy a nearly limitless range of design and performance requirements.
USP Structural Connectors
Phone: 800-328-5934 Email: info@uspconnectors.com Web: www.uspconnectors.com Product: Cold Formed Steel Holdowns Description: USP Structural Connectors offers the LTS20B and HTT14S holdowns, designed for both new construction and retrofit applications for concrete to steel connections. For more information visit our website.
Valmont Industries
Phone: 402-359-2201 Email: kyle.debuse@valmont.com Web: www.hsssuperstruct.com Product: HSS SuperStruct Description: Custom HSS ranging from 12 – 60 inches in squares and rectangles.
Vulcraft/Verco Group
Phone: 402-844-2570 Email: mike.klug@nucor.com Web: www.vulcraft.com Product: Steel Joists and Joist Girders Description: Open web-steel joists and joist girders are an engineered, truss-like construction component used to support loads over short and long spans. Steel joists and joist girders provide an economical system for supporting floors and roofs. Vulcraft joists and joist girders are designed/manufactured in accordance to the Steel Joist Institute. Product: Steel Decking Description: Used in many applications, but is particularly well suited to roofing and flooring. Vulcraft manufactures many different types of deck, including roof deck, floor deck, composite floor deck and cellular deck. A full line of deck accessories, such as end closure and pour stop, is also available.
Software
AceCad Software
Phone: 610-280-9840 Email: sales@acecadsoftware.us Web: www.acecadsoftware.com Product: StruM.I.S Description: Features and connectivity benefits designed specifically for larger steelwork fabrication companies. StruM.I.S Enterprise comes with additional training, implementation and allocated development specification time, for extended integration to ensure workflow with your current systems for maximum organizational success. StruM.I.S Enterprise is the complete software system for businesses.
Applied Science International, Inc.
Phone: 919-645-4090 Email: sscoba@appliedscienceint.com Web: www.appliedscienceint.com Product: SteelSmart® System v7.0 (SSS) Description: Easily perform progressive collapse, blast, and seismic analysis for cold-formed steel structures with ELS’s easy to use cold-formed steel sections. Perform static or dynamic analysis with full nonlinear material and geometric behavior including buckling, post-buckling, P-Delta, contact, collision, and debris all automatically calculated by the solver.
Product: Extreme Loading® for Structures v3.1 (ELS) Description: Easily perform progressive collapse, blast, and seismic analysis for cold-formed steel structures with ELS’s easy to use cold-formed steel sections. Perform static or dynamic analysis with full nonlinear material and geometric behavior including buckling, post-buckling, P-Delta, contact, collision, and debris all automatically calculated by the solver.
CSC, Inc.
Phone: 877-710-2053 Email: sales@cscworld.com Web: www.cscworld.com Product: Tedds Description: A powerful software that will speed up your daily structural and civil calculations. Using Tedds you can access a large library of automated calculations or write your own, while creating high quality and transparent documentation.
Product: Fastrak Description: An essential design and drafting software for steel buildings. Structural engineers use Fastrak to design simple or complex steel buildings. Produce clear and concise documentation including drawings and calculations, all to US codes.
online
All past issues
News, Events, Book Reviews, Letters to the Editor and more! Design Data
Phone: 402-441-4000 Email: marnett@sds2.com Web: www.sds2connect.com Product: SDS/2 Connect Description: Enables structural engineers using Revit Structure for BIM to intelligently design steel connections and produce detailed documentation on those connections. Th e only product that enables structural engineers to design and communicate connections based on their Revit Structure design model as part of the fabrication process.
Devco Software, Inc.
Phone: 541-426-5713 Email: rob@devcosoftware.com Web: www.devcosoftware.com Product: LGBEAMER V8 Pro Description: Analyze and design cold-formed cee, channel and zee sections. Uniform, concentrated, partial span and axial loads. Single and multi-member designs. 2007 NASPEC (2009 IBC) compliant. ProTools include shearwalls, framed openings, X-braces, joists and rafters.
Digital Canal
Phone: 800-449-5033 Email: tblum@digitalcanal.com Web: www.digitalcanal.com Product: Digital Canal’s NEW Steel Design Description: Incredibly detailed “hand calculation” reports are a “must have” to learn the new AISC code! Steel Design is available in multiple span beams and column modules as well as full-featured frame/FEA programs. Try it free our website. (AISC 13th Edition, ASD 9th and LRFD 2nd Editions)
Independence Tube
Phone: 800-376-6000 Email: sales@independencetube.com Web: www.independencetube.com Product: HSS A500 Description: Independence Tube produces HSS A500 Structural Steel Tubing at three locations. Squares (SQ) from 2 to 12 inches; Rectangles from 2½ by 1½ inches through 16 x 8 inches; Rounds from 1.66-inch OD through 16-inch OD; Walls from .109 inch through .688 inch.
Integrated Engineering Software
Phone: 406-586-8988 Email: info@iesweb.com Web: www.iesweb.com Product: VisualAnalysis Description: Provides general-purpose analysis and design features in a friendly and easy-to-learn way. Th e tool provides design checks for cold-formed steel framing as well as that for hot-rolled steel, concrete, wood, and aluminum beams, columns, truss members and more. Nemetschek Scia
Phone: 877-808-7242 Email: info@scia-online.com Web: www.nemetschek-scia.com Product: Scia Engineer Description: Scia Engineer makes it easy to plug Cold Form Steel design into BIM. Go beyond simply member checks and produce full 3D structural models by integrated Cold Form Steel design with Structural Steel and Concrete. Design multi-story wall panels, trusses and even entire Cold Form Steel buildings in ONE program.
POSTEN Engineering Systems
Phone: 510-275-4750 Email: sales@postensoft.com Web: www.postensoft.com Product: TaperSTEEL Description: TaperSTEEL quickly and easily allows you to design (simple span, cantilevered or portal framed) I shaped steel plate girders and beams with varying web depth & varying fl ange width. Th e top and bottom of the beam or girder can slope to a ridge located anywhere across the span.
RISA Technologies
Phone: 949-951-5815 Email: info@risatech.com Web: www.risa.com Product: RISA-3D Description: Get the most out of your steel designs with RISAFloor and RISA-3D. Th e ability to use multiple materials in one FEA model makes these programs your fi rst choice for both hot rolled and cold formed steel. With 16 steel databases and 21 steel codes RISA has all your bases covered.
All Resource Guides and Updates for the 2013 Editorial Calendar are now available on the website, www.STRUCTUREmag.org. Listings are provided as a courtesy. STRUCTURE® magazine is not responsible for errors.
SOILSTRUCTURE.COM
Substructural Software
1. Soldier Pile/Wood Lagging 2. Multi-Level Tieback Walls 3. Laterally Loaded Drilled Pier 4. Anchored or Cant. Sheetpile 5. Cantilever Retaining Wall
Only $280 to $450. Nothing to ship.
Same Day Email Activation
Free Downloads at: http://www.SoilStructure.com
Martin/Martin gains the competitive edge with Tedds
Patrick McManus, Technical Director, explains how Martin/Martin saved time, improved consistency and enhanced quality control by standardizing on structural calculation software, Tedds.
“At Martin/Martin we work on a variety of commercial projects and specialize in arena and stadium work, defensive design and construction services. To meet the requirements of such demanding and differing projects we historically used software packages from multiple vendors. This was dif cult to manage as each software package had its own interface and approached engineering problems differently.
No single engineer knew every product in-depth, which created problems with quality control, consistency, and it impacted project scheduling. What we really needed was a single software package that could reliably and accurately do everything we needed.”
“Tedds was our ideal solution because it provided an extensive library of calculations and created transparent output with detailed equations. It also reduced the need to perform calculations by hand, which had been very time consuming. Tedds also offered us the capability to write our own calculations which has been invaluable. It works within the Microsoft Word interface, enabling us to develop custom tools that allow us to ef ciently handle complicated problems that have not been well addressed by other software developers. This has given us a competitive advantage and we see great potential to take this further.”
“Since standardizing on Tedds we have decreased our number of vendors, which has saved time for our information technology teams and our engineers speak to fewer technical support teams.
Tedds is really easy to use so it has become a staple tool for all our engineers, who now a staple tool for all our engineers, who now use the Tedds library daily for our quick component calculations. We have also standardized our output which immediately standardized our output which immediately improved our consistency and quality control. “Tedds has helped us to meet aggressive project demands and deliver a high quality service to our clients.”
Without Tedds, calculations would have taken considerably longer to develop and verify, with less transparent output. Tedds is exible, it’s regularly updated and the size of the library means we can quickly respond to the changing needs of our clients.”
CSC thanks Martin/Martin for its contribution to this case study.
See the bene ts of Tedds for yourself with our free trial.
Free Trial
Download Tedds at cscworld.com/TryTedds
877 710 2053 (Toll Free) www.cscworld.com