Navigation:  Working With Beam Calculations > Beam Loads > Launching With Revit Floors With Area Loads > Typical Floor Conditions > Stepped Floor Edges

Conditions where a step or discontinuity occurs in the floor edge require more careful attention to the sampling density currently selected in the Preferences menu.  Discrete sampling approaches, especially the modes with very few sampling points, are unlikely to actually capture the behavior in such cases.

Sampling the beam shown above at “Midspan Only” would incorrectly result in a fully uniform loading diagram.  Sampling the beam with a slightly denser but still discrete mode, such as “Quarter Points Plus Ends” would detect the existence of variation, but would not have adequate density of data to interpret the loads properly.  

For this example beam, the recommended approach is to use the “Complete Contour” sampling mode.  This results in a complete and accurate loading diagram that shows all of the following features:

1.A uniform load on one side of the beam:

a.Tributary width = 3.5 ft

b.Mapped to the “Loads All Spans” tab

2.The larger partial uniform load due to large slab overhang:

a.Tributary width = 5.5 ft

b.Mapped to the “Span Loads” tab

3.The smaller partial uniform load due to the small slab overhang

a.Tributary width = 3.0 ft

b.Mapped to the “Span Loads” tab