Author Topic: Bentley Structural  (Read 18432 times)

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MickD

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #15 on: January 26, 2006, 10:10:23 PM »
Skint, Chuck is talking about Triforma which is native Bently AFAIK. I had a demo of it a while ago and found it to be quite good as the objects created were 'smart' objects in that they stored valuable info on the objects whereas std 3d objects are simple volumetric structures. I don't think it had any automatic connections etc but modelling was pretty similar to AutoCAD if not easier. Apparently the word was at the time that AutoCAD was the best for 2d and Bently was better at 3d, while I didn't get time to fully use Triforma and MS (the learning curve used up all my demo time!) I did find 3d ok and 2d was 'awkward' after AutoCAD.
I did like the way you could create 2d details from the model into 2d files that were linked to and from the model, that was neat.
I think I still have a demo disk here somewhere, I'll have to have another look ;)
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Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #16 on: January 26, 2006, 10:15:33 PM »
Some time in the very near future, we are going to have a web demo / conference call with Bentley, after which we will get a demo of the software to test drive for a month.  That should give us enough information to at least make some sort of intelligent evaluation.

MickD

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #17 on: January 26, 2006, 10:59:06 PM »
I just had a look at the ets site that has some demo's to look at once you register, very smart! Have a look at the Building section and the structural demo's in there. The 2d/3d two way capability is probably one of the best features.
I forgot all about accudraw, I quite like the way it worked in 3d how you could flip the ucs with a key press etc.
I'm actually doing some work for a company at the moment who are pushing me to using MS as that is their clients' prefered format, their client is 'very' big in the mining and plant feild and could be the source of a lot of my future work!

From memory, I think Triforma was only about 25% more cost than vanilla V8, this is very good value for a smart product.

It will be interesting to hear your thoughts after the demo.
"Short cuts make long delays,' argued Pippin.”
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MickD

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #18 on: February 19, 2006, 10:12:52 PM »
Chuck, have you had a chance to have a look at this yet? I'd be interested in your opinion, I filled in an info request but have had no response as yet!
"Short cuts make long delays,' argued Pippin.”
J.R.R. Tolkien

Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #19 on: February 20, 2006, 07:40:52 AM »
They did a webex demo for us a couple of weeks ago, but it didn't go well.  Throughout the demo, we all kept wondering why the guy demonstrating the software couldn't seem to understand our questions.  Then we found out he was not a structural engineer (not even close).  He was an architect, and he had no idea what kind of information we would be likely to want to show on our drawings.

They are trying to schedule another demo with their (apparently only) structural person, but his availability is pretty limited, so it might be a month or more before we can get it set up.

I did manage to garner a little information from the demo, though.  It looks like the software is very powerful, and fairly flexible, but also extremely complicated.  It's fairly obvious to me that it will do what we want it to do, but I think it is going to take a very long time to learn how to be productive with it.  The user interface is extremely complicated, but if you could ever master it I imagine you could really crank out the work.

MickD

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #20 on: February 20, 2006, 03:28:11 PM »
Thanks Chuck, after quite a bit of tracking down I found the last Australian distributer for Bentley who will be organising a trial cd for us.
After what little I've seen I also think it would be a good thing and I was very impressed with 2d drawing production but I've yet to see any steel detailing type production from it and wonder how it will fair (i.e. ortho views and sections of assemblies).
It has also jumped up a bit in price and with a bit of work I can get Autocad to do what I need... but then I also need time!
"Short cuts make long delays,' argued Pippin.”
J.R.R. Tolkien

Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #21 on: February 28, 2006, 08:53:06 PM »
We finally had our demo with the structural guy from Bentley yesterday.  I went much more smoothly than the previous demo, but the outcome seems to be that the software isn't going to offer us enough benefit to justify the expense and training down time.  It's funny because my boss was the one who was all excited about this and he ended up being the one to poo poo it in the end.  I think he made the right decision, but it's still funny.

Kerry

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #22 on: February 28, 2006, 09:03:02 PM »
Heh Chuck, at least the man was prepared to think outside the box a little .. kudos for that.
kdub, kdub_nz in other timelines.
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Everything will work just as you expect it to, unless your expectations are incorrect.
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Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #23 on: February 28, 2006, 09:13:17 PM »
His thinking typically involves convincing the box that, for the type of work it is expecting us to do, it really should be paying us more money.  Some might call him a schemer.  :D

diarmuid

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #24 on: June 07, 2006, 06:55:12 AM »
if i were you i would investigate Speedikon industrial, its very powerfull and is compatable with autocad, bently structural as far as i know is a microstation based product.  and you dont want to go down that road

hth
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Bob Wahr

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #25 on: June 07, 2006, 11:26:16 AM »
I've always compared using Microstation vs AutoCAD to using a standard vs. RPN calculator.  They'll both do exactly the same thing, you just have to think differently to get there and the one you are used to is a much better system.  I would be extremely wary of running any Bentley verticals in AutoCAD.  Based on my experience doing it with Civil SelectCAD and AutoCAD, the thing that Bentley is best at getting AutoCAD to do is crash.  It could be smoke blowing by adesk marketers but RAM is supposed to work with Revit Structure in the near soonness.  I hope so anyway.

I started using V8 just recently working for an unnamed company
It must be hard for them to do marketing.

Maverick®

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #26 on: June 07, 2006, 11:31:13 AM »
It must be hard for them to do marketing.

 :lmao:

jtbworld

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #27 on: July 22, 2006, 01:46:39 PM »

Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #28 on: July 22, 2006, 08:19:13 PM »
Funny thing.  My boss recently started talking about this again.  I think maybe he is anticipating having some down time where we could do some training without interrupting real work.

I'm still not completely sold, but it would nice to not have my skills become completely outdated.

Chuck Gabriel

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Re: Bentley Structural
« Reply #29 on: July 22, 2006, 10:01:47 PM »
On the topic: http://jtbworld.blogspot.com/2006/07/structural-steel-cad-software.html

Thanks Jimmy.  I have actually seen Tekla Structures as well.  An independent detailer who was doing the detailing on one of our projects was using it and was so excited about it, he wanted to show it to us.

I was very impressed with the software.  However, the pricing wasn't even in the same ballpark as Revit or Bentley Structural, and you have to pay extra for additional modules if you want to get the full range of functionality from it.