As an all-round engineering office for Construction, Industry & Infrastructure, Macobo offers a comprehensive package of coordinated engineering services to project developers and architects. Founded in 2008 by Ing. Davy Macquoi and organically grown from customer needs, Macobo currently employs about 50 specialized staff who support the further expansion of this ambitious engineering office from Tessenderlo (Belgium) and Dubai.
Improving our agility as an engineering team
As Macobo’s Structural Design team leader, ing. Liesbeth Torfs is closely involved in highly diverse projects. She’s more than happy to comment on some of the recent and current projects that her team has worked on. "Crematorium Stuifduin (Lommel, Belgium) is a beautiful example of a challenging project in which all partners (including a2o architecten, Groep Vanhout and Macobo) collaborate intensively on a central BIM model", according to Liesbeth Torfs.
"But the structural design of this building is quite a challenge as well," Liesbeth continues. "Fortunately, the advanced 3D structural design analysis capabilities of BuildSoft's Diamonds software have come in extremely handy. Starting from a 3D model of the entire concrete structure, including foundations, Diamonds has enabled us to come up with a practical reinforcement plan in a very short time. The ability to define reinforcement nets for slabs and walls is a convenient feature that significantly increases our productivity. It does not only visualize where additional reinforcement is required to achieve a good design, but it also informs us on the amount of additional reinforcement that is needed locally.
The considerable spans and cantilevers that are typical for projects such as Crematorium Stuifduin, primarily impose special requirements related to maximum deformations of the building structure. That's why Diamonds' capability to calculate cracked deformations of concrete elements, while considering the effective amount of reinforcement, has become part of our standard design procedure for concrete building structures. Our experience shows that in this way we can deliver a quality structural design that satisfies all building requirements in an economically sound manner.
Calculation times are also a definite plus of Diamonds. Because Diamonds allows us to recalculate a structural design in just a matter of minutes, we firmly improve our agility as an engineering team. Much more than in the past, we are involved in the design process from the early stages – getting more opportunities to deliver input."
Considerable spans and cantilevers primarily impose special requirements related to maximum deformations of the building structure. Diamonds’ capability to realistically calculate cracked deformations of concrete elements helps deliver a quality structural design that satisfies all building requirements in an economically sound manner.