Moderately Ductile and Ductile shear walls can now be designed within MASS to satisfy the ductility verification (required by CSA S304-14) Any designers struggling with post-disaster strictures or the axial load limitations of conventional construction masonry will be happy to know that MASS Version 4.0 has the ability to perform Read more…
Added to the 2015 National Building Code of Canada is a new design pathway that can be used for areas with very low seismic hazard levels. If you are designing shear walls in an area with very low spectral acceleration values (Looking at you Manitoba and Saskatchewan) then we we Read more…
While not always calculated at the critical location of a wall, out-of-plane walls are typically governed by flexure. In cases where a bug or other issue is found in the MASS software, announcements are posted on the software’s known bugs page, as well as on this page here. While Read more…
Bugs are found from time to time and in our effort to be trustworthy and transparent, they are posted here as well as appearing on the MASS Welcome Screen The known bugs page has moved from the MASS website to the MASS section of the CMDC website. The following Read more…
Version 4.0 adds to the scope of what MASS is capable of handling It’s real, and it’s spectacular! We are very excited to announce this new release, available immediately and for free to all current, active license holders. This post originally appeared on the new MASS documentation website. Click Read more…
Version 4.0 adds to the scope of what MASS is capable of handling It’s real, and it’s spectacular! We are very excited to announce this new release, available immediately and for free to all current, active license holders. If you are currently using Version 3, you can upgrade to Read more…
Oh yes we did! The title speaks for itself and engineers (or their I.T. professionals) everywhere rejoice Due to some behind the scenes changes out of our control, access to the MASS activation server directly from each user’s application was severed, resulting in each activation to needing to be performed Read more…
With MASS Version 4.0 moving into Multi-Storey Shear Wall design, why doesn’t the software check for something that seems squarely within its expanded scope? Dating back a few years in the MASS development process, a lot of work was put into adding the capability for the software to check Read more…
The addition of boundary elements to MASS Version 4 (as well as CSA S304-14) means that failing a ductility verification is not the end of the line Boundary elements allow for the confinement of reinforcement in compression. Not only does this unlock more flexural capacity as steel in compression Read more…
New to Version 4 is a more intuitive way to navigate drawings The interface for navigating drawings using anything other than the scroll bars was inconsistent and confusing. For example, does scrolling up using the mouse zoom in or pan the image upward? The answer for years was “sometimes just Read more…