ABSTRACT
The globalization of world’s economy combined with the information and communication revolution will, without doubt, impact the building and construction industry. For the South African construction industry to be competitive globally, the design engineer has to operate freely across the political and economic boundaries of the world. Contrary to the above, the South African Limit States Steel Design code for hot-rolled steel has not followed the route of European globalization and uniformity like the concrete design. The structural Eurocodes have managed to achieve convergence of a consistent structural design practice in Europe. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of current developments in hot-rolled structural steel design. These include the formulation of the design principles and a comparison of the load factors, load combination and material resistance factors. The comparison of the material resistance factors is based on reliability indices performed using Monte Carlo simulation. Although the results of the comparison do not show significant differences, the design formulations in Eurocode are complex, and difficult to follow for a practicing engineer, thus making it difficult to adopt the Eurocode. However, in order to reduce technical barriers to international trade for South African practicing engineers, it is proposed in the paper to adapt the Eurocode with certain simplifications for the South African environment. The proposal includes the use of the material resistance factors calibrated against the current load factors recommended in the South African Loading Code. The Eurocodes, in any case, do allow for countries to use the National Application Document, through “boxed” values.
