COLUMN DESIGN TO CP110

The new rules for concrete column design which appear in CP110 are discussed. The discussion centers around a comprehensive flow chart prepared by the author to facilitate the interpretation of CP110, and which is included in the article. With the aid of the flow chart, comments are made on the various decisions that are involved, these include whether the column is braced or unbraced, whether it is slender or short, its external dimensions, whether the column is lightly loaded and whether it carries a load at large eccentricity. Tables are included of n/bh (direct load divided by external dimensions) values for unreinforced and 8% steel reinforced columns for various values of the factor "K". These may be used to prepare charts which may be utilized to readily calculate the K factor for any column in order to establish the most economic design. /TRRL/