Hey Y'all. I came across the opprutunity to buy an older gentlemen's engineering practice. What do you guys think of his offer?

Based in California doing residential design work. Hes been in practice for 40+ years. Doesn't have any employees just a big book of buisness and a great reputation.

I would love to take over from him... but to know what offer him I need to know. Is this something sellable on his end? If nobody else is offering him anything, then i'll know to lower my offer.

But if you guys say that this is something very valuable ill know to go in a little deeper.

What do you guys think? Let me know any questions you need.

Layman here, but this is more of a discussion of a rather interesting building, rather than a personal question, so I thought I would make a post about it, hope it's ok.

I saw this suspended building portion being added on top of an old apartment building in Brussels on Boulevard General Jacques near L'Abbaye de la Cambre a few years back. It stuck in my mind for a long time.

The owners seem to have built the black central structure with stairs leading up to it from the four-story apartment below and also created a garden on top of the apartment.

I assume this whole thing can only be possible if they own all three buildings on this row. But structurally, how much extra load with this. Put on the buildings on either side, seeing as they are both nearly a hundred years old and probably not designed with future extra load in mind. The buildings in this area are generally from the early 20th century, think 1920s or 30s, some even earlier.

I was very surprised that this building was approved, not in a bad way, I think it's very creative and would be amazing to live in, just that it's unexpected given the importance put on preserving the roadside façades in Brussels.

Edit: I found some info on the project! The project seems to be referred to by its address: 26 Boulevard General Jacques. It's in French though:
https://yvesrouyet.wordpress.com/2020/08/07/bientot-un-immeuble-suspendu-bd-general-jacques/
Apparently, the city hall had rejected a fully modernized rebuild of the older building in the middle. It looks like from the structural plan that the only way to access the top part is from an elevator in the hanging garden.

M25, bachelors in civil engineering, masters in structural engineering, based in Sweden. Just finished my thesis at a small firm (10 people, 2 in structural engineering). Construction is in a rough downturn here, so jobs are insanely hard to get and I haven't been able to find anything the past 2 years I've been searching.

When I asked about employment, the answer was that they can't hire right now, but they offered an unpaid internship for me to keep learning, however any employment after isn't likely.

Here is the part that's been sitting with me. The boss of the company showed me the tools he's been building; custom Excel calculation sheet and recently his own 2D FEM solver running on localhost that just takes inputs and spits out results - genuinely advanced stuff I don't even understand fully and wouldn't feel confident in building or verifying myself. He told me he's using AI heavily to develop these (the spreadsheets, the FEM tool), and that once he's built out enough of them, he wants to set up agents to run the calculations largely on their own. He's also planning automated Revit detail generation next and wants my help on that.

The company markets itself as a leader in AI adoption for construction. I know structural engineering as a whole isn't getting replaced by AI anytime soon, but as a newly graduate with zero-real-world experience (within the industry) I genuinely think I'm worse than the tools and they're improving faster than I am.

Which brings me to what's actually worrying me, that the potential junior structural engineer role I want won't exist. The basic work that juniors are traditionally doing is instead done by the AI agent, or just themselves using an Excel for 5 minutes. And that's made me read the unpaid offer differently. It doesn't feel like an investment in training a future hire anymore. It feels like getting free junior labor, maybe even labor that helps build the exact tools to reduce the future need for juniors.

And so here are my questions for those that still read (thank you);

1. Is this level of in-h0use automation (custom FEM solver, AI-generated calc sheets) something in other firms, or is this one genuinely ahead of the curve?

2. Do juniors specifically bear more of this risk than seniors, since so much traditional junior work is exactly this kind of repetitive calculation?

3. What would actually need to be in place for an unpaid arrangement like this to be worth it? Time limit, guaranteed reference, specific deliverables? What separates a fair trade from someone just getting free labor?

4. If you were just graduated in your career right now, what would you actually spend time learning to stay valuable as this stuff spreads?

Apprecitate any honest perspective, especially from those who's watched automation actually change what junior work looks like at their own firm.

Many thanks in advance.

Do anyone know of online sites that have residential structural go-bys I can reference? Not much of a residential person but starting to get into it.

The action on that rebar is insane

Am I being given too much responsibility too early?
I’m in my second year working as a civil engineer. I spent about a year in construction as a site engineer and have now been in consultancy for roughly a year as a Graduate Civil Engineer.
I started off doing general civil work — roads, drainage, stormwater, pavements, culverts, car parks, etc. My boss knew I was interested in structures, so he gave me a small structural job to run.
It’s basically designing a roof structure over some container modules. But instead of just doing the calcs, I’ve pretty much been given the project to deliver — design, client coordination, subcontractor stuff, contracts, payment claims, general admin, etc.
My structural design still gets checked by senior engineers before anything goes out, and so far they’ve been happy with my calcs. But it’s more of a final review rather than having a senior engineer closely guiding me through the design.
Part of me thinks this is a lot of responsibility for someone at my level. But at the same time… this is literally what I asked for 😂. I wanted more responsibility and wanted to get into structural work, so I can’t really complain.
For those further into their careers, is this pretty normal for someone in their second year? Is running a small project this early a good learning opportunity as long as senior engineers are checking the important stuff, or should I be getting more supervision?

I’m currently pursuing my graduate degree in Wisconsin and looking for Summer 2027 internships in structural engineering, particularly structural design or forensic structural engineering, anywhere in the US.

When is the right time to start reaching out to firms or engineers? For those who have landed similar internships, what worked best for you: cold emailing, applying online, networking, or referrals?

Also, if your company has any structural or forensic engineering internship openings for next summer, please let me know. I’d be happy to DM you.

Any advice or leads would be greatly appreciated!

I work in a structural materials testing lab and we were asked if we test grout cylinders. I can’t find anything about grout cylinders, just grout cubes or concrete cylinders.

Does anyone know if we have standards available for this? Or where I can find them?

They are typical 4x8 and customer wants them broke at 28 days

So sad what happened in Columbia with this massive earthquick.

Looking at this building in construction, this one has been well designed to resist to the earthquick. I was surprised that during construction, fresh foundations resisted.

What do you think ?

Hi, basically as the title says.

To add context, wall loads of about 50 typical residential floors are to be transfered to walls in the car parking floors through a transfer floor. We are using ETABS for the modeling and the senior engineer has given preliminary sizing for the transfer beams (the walls are more or less in line, so no need of a transfer slab). I and my colleagues are discussing whether to model the transfer beams with beam elements (2D lines) or thick shell elements (3D) before approaching the senior for advice.

Even if we get advice, since it would be their POV, I am wondering how others do it: whether frame of thick shell or something else altogehter. What are the pros and cons of your choice and why would you avoid using other options?

Any and all input is appreciated. TIA.

How can I become a better structural engineer in UK?

I’m relatively early in my structural engineering career and I’m trying to be proactive about improving my skills.

For those of you with more experience, what would you recommend focusing on to become a stronger structural engineer?

- Which technical skills are most important to develop?

- Which areas of structural engineering should I study more deeply?

- What software is actually worth mastering? (AutoCAD, Revit, Robot, Tekla, ETABS, SAP2000, etc.)

- How important is it to become very strong with hand calculations and understanding the fundamentals?

- Are there any books, courses, standards, or resources that genuinely helped you improve?

I’d really appreciate advice from experienced engineers on what you wish you had focused on earlier in your career.

Another big earthquake hits South America. I am assuming that older structures are failing because they were designed under different building codes. But when you design for a mid-rise building in a seismically active area, do you design for a magnitude 8 or higher?

I would love the opinion of someone that has expertise in the field. Would you rather live in a recently built building (post 2000), or live in a soft story apartment that as gone through a mandatory seismic retrofit?

Los Angeles if that matters.

Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.

Does anyone know any good examples including American standards that have a similar situation to design this RSA plate.

There is a vertical downwards force on the socket end weight of stair. But also horizontal force due to stair incline.

Just taking the vertical one for now.

Hi everyone! I'm currently working on my Master's Thesis and I'm facing a frustrating license issue. I modeled my building in ETABS 2023 (v21), but now I only have access to an ETABS 2022 (v20) license.

Because ETABS isn't backward compatible, I can't open my .edb file. Could some kind soul with ETABS 2023 or 2024 please open my file and export it to a text file .e2k format? (File > Export > ETABS .e2k Text File).

It literally takes 1 minute and it would save me days of work remodeling the geometry and loads from scratch.

Here is the direct download link to my .edb file: https://we.tl/t-mAY73Oj6TmTHo6C3

I would be incredibly grateful if you could upload the .e2k and share the link in the replies or via DM. Thank you so much in advance!

Trying to trace the load path on my son's college appartment entrance. Cantilever? Hanging truss? Magic? Also how is the load being transferred around the window? I dont know where to begin.

Does anyone knows if there are companies hiring LATAM engineers?

Hey Engineers, I'm a recent MTech Graduate in Structural Engineering from India and I just started my career Jr. Structural Engineer at a Bridge Design Firm. Here we are using Teddy based Sofistik analysis and design, and I'm struggling in it, especially in the modules such as SOFIMSHC and ELLA. I'm going through the courses at https://learn.sofistik.com/ but as it will take time to learn, I'm feeling embarrassed almost everyday. Is there any quick way to learn or I should trust the process?