SIR,
I have a column with guides at different levels. How can I to consider these guides in the calculation.

Your answer will be very apreciate.
Best regards,
Banica Mircea

Dear Mircea Banica,

To accurately model the guides on the vessel, one will have to account for the interaction between the vessel and the guides. PVElite cannot model this; you can use a FEA program such as our CAESAR II program. CAESAR II, which is a pipe stress analysis program using 3-D beam element, can model guides along with static analysis of Wind/Earthquake.

The guides will probably be active in the Wind/Earthquake loadings, if you can estimate the stresses under the Wind/Earthquake loads (Wind/Earthquake report provides the loads at the c.g. of each element). Then those stresses can be manually combined with other stresses computed by the program listed in the "Stresses due to...” report.

If wind effect is the only concern, will the placement of "lug" at the guide locate do the "trick"?