OPTIMIZATION OF LARGE SPACE FRAME STEEL STRUCTURES

Optimization of large space frame steel structures subjected to realis tic code-specified stress, displacement, and buckling constraints is i nvestigated. The basis of design is the American Institute of Steel Co nstruction (AISC) Allowable Stress Design (ASD) specifications. The ty pes of structures considered are space moment resisting frames with an d without bracings. The structures are subjected to wind loadings acco rding to the Uniform Building Code (UBC) in addition to dead and Live loads. The parallel-vector algorithm developed in this research is app lied to three highrise building structures ranging in size from a 20-s tory structure with 1,920 members to a 60-story structure with 5,760 m embers, and its parallel processing and vectorization performance is e valuated. For the largest structure, speedups of 6.4 and 17.8 are achi eved due to parallel processing (using eight processors) and vectoriza tion, respectively. When vectorization is combined with parallel proce ssing a very significant speedup of 97.1 is achieved.