HOLLOW STRUCTURAL SECTIONS IN BUILDING CONSTRUCTION Frederick J, Palmer Copperweld Tubing Group Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15230

Presented March 12, 1982 National Engineering Conference

as sponsored by AISC

A B S T R A C T

HOLLOW STRUCTURAL SECTIONS IN BUILDING CONSTRUCTION

Frederick J. Palmer

Long considered the workhorse of tubular products, structural steel tubing

has found its way into a variety of applications including agriculture equipment, railroad cars, roll over protective structures, lighting standards, sign structures, and highway guide rails. Since its introduction in the 1960's, the hollow structural section has been
widely used in a variety of building applications in Europe and Canada. Its

position as a fully accepted member of the family of structural steel sections within these countries is due largely to the technical and promotional support programs provided by foreign producers, engineers and user organizations.

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Frederick J. Palmer, Manager-Engineering Copperweld Tubing Group, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15230

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Due to the lack of technological and promotional support in this country, the

United States has lagged behind in its useage of the hollow structural section.
Gradually, however, the aesthetic qualities and structural efficiency of the
hollow section is coming to be recognized by American architects and engineers.
According to statistics reported to the Welded Steel Tube Institute, shipments

of structural steel tubing to the building construction industry in 1980 have

increased by 100 percent over structural shipments to the same market in 1972.
It is not surprising that major uses for hollow structural steel tubing have
developed in buildings where the steel tubing is dramatically exposed to view. Typical examples of such applications include covered stadiums, ice rinks and

exhibit pavilions.
In the award winning Coat Street Park Ice Skating Facility in Wilkes-Barre, Penn-

sylvania, the architects followed through on this design concept. The pitched roof

of the rink is supported by 6 ft. deep trusses, spaced at 20 ft. apart which were fabricated from 6" X 6" hollow sections. Hollow section beams span between the trusses supporting the ribbed aluminum roof.
To capitalize on the open, airy feeling of the hollow sections, well known for their efficient use of space, the architects left the sides of the building open

to the elements as well. The ice skating complex located in a municipal park, services two neighborhoods and is adaptable for alternative activities in the
summer months.

Another exciting design concept in building construction is the development of

space frames. These can be either monumental, one of a kind structures, such as the design of the New York City Convention and Exhibition Center or more straight(more)

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forward applications such as the Poplar Creek Music Theatre near Chicago, a prototype for a national chain of similar theaters.

Top priority for architects designing the New York City Convention Center was to tame the enormous size of the building. When completed, the center will stretch
1200 feet, or five city blocks, along Manhattan's llth and 12th Avenues.
The tubular space frame design will allow the building to appear light and airy.

Opaque by day, the semi-reflective glass covering the building will reflect the
Manhattan skyline. By night interior lighting will turn the glass transparent revealing the space frame walls and roofs. Unobstructed sightlines were also an essential requirement met by the 60,000 sq. ft. structural steel space frame at Poplar Creek. The music theatre can accommodate an audience of 20,000 7,000 under roof and 13,000 more on the sloping
lawns that curve around the back of the house.

The steel tube space frame, with a depth of 8-ft., bears on inverted 8-ft. pyramidal space frame sections, which in turn bear on concrete columns 42" in diameter.

Since only six columns circle the back of the house, they offer minimal visual
obstruction to spectators on the lawn.
Using square tubing of varying sizes, the openness of the space frame design

accommodated the architect's need for size and intimacy. Aesthetic appearance, torsional stiffness and excellent compressive strength are
some of the characteristics which make structural steel tubing excellent for the

design of truss members. Although many design variations are possible with hollow
structural sections, recently a high school in Andover, Kansas made use of

rectangular tubing in a planar truss.

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Providing roof support, four trusses span the 110 foot long common room. The tubular truss was selected for its pleasing appearance. When completed the

exposed truss will be painted a bright color and viewed on the interior and the
exterior of the building as well through glass entranceways.

A very unusual structural tubing roof support system can be viewed daily at the
National Air & Space Museum in Washington, DC. This roof system was designed

so that the exhibits could be suspended from it. In addition to its ability to
carry the heavy suspended loads, hollow structural steel tubing was selected to preserve the open character of the galleries and present a uniform appearance in

both vertical and horizontal sections.

Due to its structural efficiency, the hollow structural section is a natural

choice for columns in office buildings, department stores and warehouse facilities
Hollow sections have the highest compressive strength to weight ratio of any

steel section. The compact shape of structural tubing results in smaller columns

and thereby increases the amount of useable floor area.

The aesthetic qualities and structural efficiency of the hollow section is once
again the reason for its increasing use in all types of pedestrian bridges
Tubing is more efficient pound for pound than bridges fabricated from other
structural shapes. The tube section provides greater resistance to torsion and
compression. In addition, tubing can increase safety due to the elimination of sharp edges.

Available either as painted bridges or self-weathering bridges, fabricated from either carbon steel tubes or from a corrosion-resistant, high-strength, low-alloy

steel tubing, the pedestrian bridges are designed to serve such short-span
crossings as those located in city, state and federal parks, golf courses and
architectural landscapes.
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Page 5 Man drew on nature's design expertise when he first developed the hollow structural
section. The reed, the stem of a flower, the bone of an animal are just some of

nature's structural members with the ability to resist buckling forces and support substantial loads. Through time, the tubular shape developed as the most efficient
structural support system with the least expenditure of weight and material. Now with the new developments of fluid filling for fire protection and concrete

filling for composite strength as well as fire protection, man can maximize the
use of both the steel and the enclosed space. Air conditioning duct work, conduit, cable or piping can all be run through the hollow space within the tube providing a greater degree of engineering efficiency.

High rise office buildings, industrial buildings, bridges, towers and space frames
are just part of this vast building construction market. The future of hollow
structural steel tubing in building construction is limited only by the imagination of our architects and engineers.

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