Tekla Structures

Tekla Structures is our primary platform for structural steel detailing where a project genuinely benefits from a full structural BIM model — typically larger fabrication packages, or any project where structural steel needs to be coordinated against architectural and services models to catch clashes before fabrication.

Connection and bolt-level detailing is where Tekla's specific strengths matter most for fabrication clients — the software's ability to hold real, constructable connection geometry (not just schematic representation) means shop drawings generated from the model reflect what a workshop can actually build, including bolt clearances and cope details that a purely 2D detailing approach might miss.

Material take-offs and bolt lists generated directly from a Tekla model stay consistent with the drawings by construction, since both are derived from the same underlying structural geometry rather than compiled as separate, parallel exercises that can drift out of sync.

For projects requiring coordination with other disciplines, Tekla models export cleanly into Navisworks and similar federation tools, supporting clash detection against services and architectural models before steel is fabricated — a coordination step that prevents far more expensive on-site rework than it costs to run.

Tekla's numbering and phasing tools support the piece-mark discipline that makes a large fabrication job trackable on a real shop floor — a consistent, logical numbering scheme applied through the model, rather than assigned manually and inconsistently across a large drawing set, is one of the more practical benefits of detailing directly in Tekla rather than a purely 2D platform.

Where a project involves both structural steel and precast concrete, Tekla's capability to model and detail both within the same environment supports a level of interface coordination between the two trades that's difficult to replicate working from separate, disconnected drawing sets.

For fabricators running their own Tekla model as part of an ongoing capability build-up, we can work within their existing model templates, custom component libraries and numbering conventions rather than introducing our own, keeping the fabricator's growing model library internally consistent across projects.

Tekla's drawing view management, applied consistently across a large shop drawing set, keeps section and detail views correctly associated with their parent member as the design changes, avoiding the disconnect that can develop between a drawing view and its underlying model geometry when changes are made without regenerating dependent views.

Reinforced concrete detailing within Tekla, where a project's scope extends to concrete alongside structural steel, benefits from the same model-driven consistency between the 3D model and derived 2D bar bending schedules that we apply to structural steel take-offs, keeping reinforcement quantities aligned with what's actually detailed.

For larger structural packages split across several detailers working concurrently, Tekla's multi-user modelling environment supports genuine parallel work on the same federated model, and we set up model splitting and access permissions deliberately at project start so several people can detail different areas without overwriting each other's work.

Rebar and reinforcement detailing within Tekla, where a project's scope includes concrete alongside structural steel, benefits from the same parametric consistency applied to steel connections — bar shapes, laps and cover requirements are modelled to reflect real fabrication and placement constraints, not just theoretical reinforcement quantities.

Custom component development for a fabricator's specific standard connection details is a valuable investment for an ongoing client relationship, since a well-built parametric component speeds up detailing considerably on repeat work compared to manually rebuilding a similar connection from scratch on every project.

Fabrication drawing automation within Tekla, correctly configured against a project's drawing standard, reduces the manual drafting effort needed to produce individual piece drawings from the model, letting detailers focus their time on the connections and details that genuinely need engineering judgement rather than routine, repetitive drawing production.

For projects involving both new steel and an existing structure, we model the existing conditions within the same Tekla environment where site survey data supports it, keeping new and existing work coordinated within a single spatial reference rather than managed as separate, disconnected models.