Cost Optimization of Composite I Beam Floor System

Abstract

The paper presents the cost optimization of the composite I beam floor system. The composite I beam floor system is designed to be constructed up of a reinforced concrete slab and doubly-symmetrical welded steel I beams. The optimization was performed by the nonlinear programming approach, NLP. An accurate objective function of the manufacturing material, power and labour costs was developed and applied for the optimization. The composite I beam floor system was optimized according to Eurocode 4 for the conditions of both the ultimate and the serviceability limit states. A numerical example of the cost optimization of a composite I beam floor system is presented at the end of the paper to expose the advantages of the proposed approach.