By default, when a full static design is run, all members are designed for both gravity and lateral combinations.

You can however tell Tekla Structural Designer to only consider gravity combinations for the design of specific members. This is achieved by checking Gravity only in an individual member's properties, i.e.

• Gravity only checked - designed for gravity combinations only
• Gravity only unchecked - designed for all combinations types: gravity, lateral and seismic

The Gravity only setting is available for beams and columns in all materials, although you would typically only ever consider checking it for steel and composite members.

Axial and minor axis checks are not performed on steel beams set to gravity only.

Setting steel columns that do not help resist lateral loads to be designed for gravity loads only, will reduce the overall design time.

Engineering judgment will be required when identifying members as being 'gravity only'.

For example:

• if an inclined braced member connects to a beam, axial force in the brace (from both gravity and lateral loads) puts the beam into bending and therefore the beam should be designed for both gravity and lateral loads.
• potentially, beams in a sloping roof would also need to be designed for both gravity and lateral load