Slab Thickness Comparison Analysis
Because the optimizer can solve for the design, it makes it quick and easy to compare solutions with different slab thicknesses. This is prohibitive to do manually due to the time it takes to solve for the design for each slab thickness. By referencing the span elevations from the soffit and the support elevations from the surface, virtually no changes are required to set up an optimization model for a different slab thickness. These different thickness runs can also be performed in parallel, using separate scenarios models created from the same base model. To accomplish this:
- Start an optimization scenario from the model with a given slab thickness.
- On the mesh input layer, change the slab thickness and re-mesh. Regenerating the mesh is important because the model is not re-meshed when it is passed into the optimizer.
- Make any adjustments necessary to the properties in the model. Normally this will be minimal, the most common being adjustments to the tendon optimization ranges to enforce proper precompression limits.
- Start a new optimization scenario.
If you want to explore multiple different slab thicknesses simultaneously, you can repeat this process for each different slab thickness. Generally setting up each different thickness model only takes a few minutes. After the optimizations are finished, you can load the scenario models, load the best trials, and compile the best design data into a chart to allow side by side comparison.
From a chart like this, it is easy to see that the most economical slab depth is 10". There may be other performance/serviceability considerations, but these can be easily explored by loading the best model from each thickness optimization and comparing them side by side.