Structural Design with ZWCAD: Collaborative and Efficient

Vastustruct is an engineering and structural design and consultancy firm established in 2004 in Pune, India. It offers a wide spectrum of innovative structural solutions including design management, design review, and progress control at all stages of work.   Having accomplished the design of a large-scale industrial shed satisfying rigorous construction standards for a recent project in South Africa, Vastustruct is initiating a more collaborative and efficient way to design industrial constructions.  

Overwhelmed by Various Standards and Time Competition

Vastustruct’s team comprises of professional structural engineers and designers who are especially familiar with international steel and concrete design conforming to detailing standards and codes.   However, these standards including various industrial and safety norms usually make the projects more complicated with tight constraints. Collaborating with the clients and teams working on different standards is a strenuous task, which becomes more challenging when some of them still use traditional CAD software, making file compatibility another concern. “

We want to make sure that our structural engineers work closely with clients and collaborators and stay up to date with industrial issues so that they can better innovate under real-world challenges and all kinds of constraints.” Said Rahul Dingane, the MD of VastuStruct.  

What makes the situation even more difficult is that their competitors are racing to deliver projects at lower prices, threatening the values Vastustruct delivers to their customers. So they need to design better in a shorter time. “To win over clients, we need not only high-quality work, but excellent service as well,” Rahul continued to note, “we have to satisfy all kinds of requirements put forward by a client within the shortest time possible.

Such service capability is possible only with powerful design tools, to help enhance the quality and productivity across the whole service chain.”  

More Collaborative, More Efficient

Therefore, in order to work with different teams under different standards more seamlessly and efficiently, the structural consultants started to realign their design technology, and finally chose ZWCAD after the overall consideration of performance and relearning cost.  

The transition was smooth and the learning curve was short thanks to ZWCAD’s familiar interface and easy-to-use functions, which set a paradigm of user-friendliness for 2D design and enabled the engineers to quickly generate project deliverables such as structural system drawings and erection plans.   Figure 1. The elevation and section of the industrial shed finished with ZWCAD in the South African Program  

Except for the increased efficiency, the interaction between not only people, but data and information as well, has also been improved, making the whole workflow a more seamless one. The project in South Africa has well proven that -- the design of a huge industrial shed was accomplished owe to the seamless collaboration of the Vastustruct team and the information-rich and model-based workflows offered by ZWCAD:  

DWG format compatibility of ZWCAD enabled an uncomplicated and complete data exchange between different project participants.  

ZWCAD’s 3D modeling environment, which is friendly to every one, helped streamline the collaboration with the extended project team so issues could be resolved more quickly.  

High usability and compatibility of model data created by ZWCAD realized the direct export for fabrication to accelerate the construction progress, and the easy export to analysis software and other third-party tools for further analysis. Drawings extracted from the approved models realized design integrity as well.  

Interdisciplinary model reviews eliminated interference or mismatching of physical drawings which can cause construction errors or delays, so that load input, beam setting and members location could be adjusted during the design phase without any concern of major errors.   As Rahul Dingane explained, “ZWCAD helps us work out the constructability of a design with the building information in the models and the possibility to use that information at all stages of construction.”   Figure 2. Model-based members detailing finished with ZWCAD in the South African project  

ZWCAD: A Good Partner for Structural Design According to Rahul, a project of this magnitude requires a unique approach. ZWCAD assisted Vastustruct team to better understand and evaluate the project performance, respond to and handle continuous changes throughout the project more quickly, and maintain the data and processes more consistently, making the whole workflow seamless and saving time and money. He said, “I think one of the main reasons for the success of this industrial shed project in South Africa is ZWCAD, which enabled us to deliver this level of precision and quality.”   Figure 3. The elevation and section of the industrial plant finished with ZWCAD in the South African Program  

“ZWCAD is a friendlier program allowing us to better understand the space. Moreover, it is lighter, faster, simpler to operate and integrates well with other programs, making it possible for us to work on larger structural projects.” Rahul concludes. The innovative and reliable ZWCAD helped Vastustruct outperform the industrial standards and distinguish itself as a leader by offering advanced structural solutions to its clients.    

About VastuStruct

Founded in 2004 in Pune, India, VastuStruct aims at offering innovative and cost-effective solutions for engineering design to meet their clients’ specification, including design management, design review with continual technical support for quality assurance and progress control at all stages of work. With a focus on customer service, quality, reliability, integrity, timeliness and ingenuity, it undertakes industrial projects for warehouse, various operation plants, food industry, hotels, hospitals, commercial complexes, residential buildings, electric substations and many other complex structures.  

About ZWSOFT

ZWSOFT (ZWCAD Software Co., Ltd.) is a world-renowned CAD/CAM solutions provider.

With a reputation as a committed and reliable provider of CAD/CAM software to the AEC and MCAD industries, ZWSOFT has created design software products that have continuously satisfied the needs of 2D and 3D drafters.

With 20 years' experience in CAD industry, our products and service are proven by over 550,000 clients across 80 countries, including US, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa, etc.