What is Tekla Tedds and why would I use it?
We asked someone with no experience of Tekla Tedds to sit down with Jamie Howarth, Enterprise Account Manager at Trimble, and go through the most basic of questions regarding the software. Read on thorough this interview to find out:
- What is Tekla Tedds?
- Who uses it?
- Why do they use it and what are the benefits?
- What is a Tedds Project?
- What is Tedds for Word?
- What's in the Tekla Tedds engineering library?
- Why does Tekla Structural Designer integrate with Tekla Tedds?
- Why does Tekla Tedds integrate with Tekla Structures?
- About the trial
- How easy is it to use Tekla Tedds?
- What’s included in a Tekla Tedds subscription?
- Watch the video blog
What is Tekla Tedds?
"Not many people know that ‘Tedds’ is an acronym that stands for ‘The Engineers Design & Documentation System’.
It does what it says in the tin: "Tekla Tedds is a simple to use software for automating hand calculations. It is created by engineers for engineers."
Incidentally, legend has it that when Tedds was originally 'invented', back in the late 1980s by CSC (UK) Ltd (pre-Trimble acquisition) one of the founders of CSC was Dr. Ted Yeadon. Some of our longest serving employees have always associated the program name with a play on words: 'Tedds' sounds the same as 'Ted's' - the apostrophe in this case meaning belonging to Ted.
Our Senior Consultant (Structural Engineering Product Development), Richard Dobson, still remembers how Tekla Tedds was part of the very large pan-European CIMSteel project, which really invented BIM for steelwork back in the late 1980s. Tekla Tedds was a part of the project until its launch in 1993. Richard presented Tekla Tedds in many guises all across Europe from 1989 to 1993 proving we were working on something very new and special - and 30+ years later, on it goes!
Who is it for?
"Tekla Tedds is for civil and structural engineers, but not specific to a sector, for instance, buildings or infrastructure, offshore or onshore. It is used across a whole host of different sectors and is useful for all of them, large companies, solo traders, and students alike."
What does it do?
"Tekla Tedds is incredibly diverse at automating calculations, it enables engineers to produce professional quality hand calculations and automate those calculations to enable them to work faster and more efficiently, getting work out the door as quickly as possible."
Why is it so popular with engineers?
"Now, in terms of why it's so widely used, it is generally down to the calculation library. There are around 180 or so different calculations that Tekla Tedds can perform, both to Eurocode and to British Standards, depending on which code you're working on. Tekla Tedds primary role is to speed up the generation of those calculations and to produce professional level documentation, which you can send to your clients or building control in order to detail-out what you're looking to communicate to your client.
The feedback we get from our customers is that Tekla Tedds really helps to eliminate any errors that can creep in during calculations, especially repetitive calculations. Because the output is predominantly locked, those errors simply can't occur unless you're adding them in as a variable, which is unlikely.
For example, I was speaking to a customer yesterday regarding one of the calculations within the library, Steel Masonry Support. It’s a really complicated calculation to do by hand and takes multiple hours depending on what variables we're putting in. Tekla Tedds can perform that calculation within 10 to 15 minutes, so the time savings we can provide on such examples are vast.
One of the main advantages to Tekla Tedds is it can really save our engineering customers substantial amounts of time, which allows them to get through more work and therefore allows them to get more work in."
What is a Tedds Project?
"Tekla Tedds is a really simple application to use. You can produce individual calculations or combine multiple Tedds documents into one project, known as a Tedds Project. This is handy if you’re working on a job that requires several Tekla Tedds calculations, for example a calculation package to be completed and submitted together."
Use the Project Manager functionality to group multiple documents together, change their order, organise them into folders and edit their headers with a common project header. "Once you are happy with your Tedds Project, the documents can be printed or saved as a pdf and sent as a package to whoever requires them. The interface is really straightforward, it's Windows based."
To find out more, see the first steps tutorial: Tedds Projects (v2020+)
What is Tedds for Word?
Most users start with Tekla Tedds, and in many cases this provides what they need. However, there may be some areas where you want more control or flexibility, such as the option to add notes, pictures and sketches to your output or the ability to combine your calculations into a single document with output from other applications, or to create your own calculations to supplement the library.
Whereas Tekla Tedds is completely self-contained and requires no knowledge of any other package, Tedds for Word is a Microsoft Word add-on. It is entirely integrated with and operates within Microsoft Word, that is why you need to have access to and some knowledge of Microsoft Word to use Tedds for Word.
Tedds for Word combines all the engineering and calculation power of Tekla Tedds with all the formatting and presentation features of Microsoft Word. The add-on allows you to format your documents the way you want, add pictures, graphs and text, and style them to your company's brand. With Tedds for Word, you can either select and execute an existing calculation in the Tedds engineering library, or create and modify your own calculations. You can also combine the two approaches and share your calculations with other Tekla Tedds users.
To find out more, see: An introduction to Tedds for Word
Interested in writing your own calculations? A training course is available, see: Tekla Tedds writing your own calculations
The Tekla Tedds engineering library
The extensive range of calculations in Tekla Tedds are arranged in Engineering Libraries, so that you can access content that is most appropriate to the project you are currently working on.
"Tekla Tedds is a complete piece of software, all our calculations are included within it, there are no additional modules you need to purchase, it comes complete.
The engineering library is divided into different aspects, for example, material and the elements themselves. This makes it easy for you to find what you’re looking for. The Tekla Tedds engineering library has multi-material calculations, masonry, concrete, retaining wall, steel. So, whatever you're looking for, generally you'll find a calculation which will suit."
Why does Tekla Structural Designer integrate with Tekla Tedds?
Tekla Structural Designer integrates with Tekla Tedds to allow you to design specific structural elements in your Tekla Structural Designer models. Seamless integration transfers the design forces to the appropriate Tedds calculation where you can check and refine your design, the final properties for the elements will then be updated in the Tekla Structural Designer model.
"We have an integration between Tekla Structural Designer and Tekla Tedds specifically for timber and precast elements, the integration allows you to have more complex shapes within your Tekla Structural Designer model, rather than 2D analysis elements within Tekla Tedds.
You can send the analysis results from Tekla Structural Designer into Tekla Tedds, which then allows you to create designs within that familiar Tekla Tedds environment and then send them back into Tekla Structural Designer once complete, which then updates the geometry in Tekla Structural Designer.
In an earlier release of Tekla Structural Designer we implemented a link through to Tekla Tedds specifically for timber design, that now enables you to design for not just steel and concrete structures, but also timber structures too, via our bilateral link between both Tekla Tedds and Tekla Structural Designer."
Why does Tekla Tedds integrate with Tekla Structures?
"One of our main focuses in the last couple of years has been to enable our customers to use more of our software in conjunction with each other."
Tekla Tedds Integrator allows you to link Tekla Tedds calculation documents to your Tekla Structures model. You can link existing documents or create new documents, which you or other Tekla Structures users can then easily modify or review during your BIM workflow. The integration reduces the amount of manual work that the detailer or engineer has to undertake in Tekla Structures thus improving productivity.
"We've created the integrator tool between Tekla Tedds and Tekla Structures to enable Tekla Structures users to send information and any components that they have within their Tekla Structures model into Tekla Tedds to perform the design. You can then send that information back into Tekla Structures and embed the calculation in the file for use further down the line in the project."
To find out more, see: Tekla Tedds Integrator user guide
About the trial
"The Tekla Tedds trial is exactly what you would get if you were buying a Tekla Tedds licence. Everything is complete within there, so you get access to the engineering library, you get access to Tedds for Word and the ability to customise all of those calculations. The Tekla Tedds trial is a 30 day trial and that 30 days starts from the moment you activate it."
How easy is it to learn Tekla Tedds?
"We’ve put a lot of effort during the last 18 months into providing as much content as we can to any potential new users, to get them up to speed as quickly as we can. We've got the First Steps tutorials, which teach the basic formats and functions of Tekla Tedds and we've also released a Tekla Tedds Fundamentals eLearning course which is freely available to all on our eLearning webpage.
We also have a more sophisticated training course for Tedds for Word, which will enable you to understand how to create your own custom calculations."
Visit Trimble Learn to find a course to suit you
What is Tekla User Assistance?
This is the central location for you to receive help and support for using Tekla products.
"All those with the trial, but also all those with a subscription to Tekla Tedds have access through to something called Tekla User Assistance. This is where all our self-help content lives and it also has lots of information on getting started with Tekla Tedds, getting you up to speed as fast as possible so that you too can start using Tekla Tedds to customise and create your calculations."
About the Tekla Tedds subscription
"Should you choose to be a subscriber to Tekla Tedds after or during a trial, you'll actually end up with three pieces of software. You'll have Tekla Tedds which includes Tedds for Word, but you'll also get access to Tekla Structural Designer LT and to Trimble Connect Business Premium."
Learn more about analysis and design subscription plans
What is Tekla Structural Designer LT?
"Tekla Structural Designer LT is 3D analysis and design software specifically with buildings in mind, it is limited to 200 structural elements and/or 8000 FE mesh shells. The reason we provide this software is we want you to be able to design more complex elements as well as the 2D elemental things that Tekla Tedds enables you to design. The 200 member limit is sufficient to be able to design a 1 to 2 storey building, an extension at the back of a house or something along those kinds of sizes."
The 200 member limit is based on the following:
- 1 Beam Span = 1 member
- 1 Column = 1 member
"So the difference between the full version of Tekla Structural Designer and the LT version of Tekla Structural Designer is simply that it is limited in scale. All of the functions exist, drawing production, the ability to analyse or design multi-material elements within there is totally unrestricted. Tekla Structural Designer also comes with British standards and Eurocodes to UK and Irish National annexes, depending on where you are based."
Learn more about Tekla Structural Designer LT on our website
What is Trimble Connect Business Premium?
"Trimble Connect Business Premium is a collaboration tool, it enables you to send data files between each of the stakeholders. You can access and view different models, whether that be Tekla Structural Designer, Tekla Structures or Revit files, and you are able to actually look at that data and interrogate the models. You can send information to site should you need to, to other users of Trimble Connect, who can access it through their phones, tablets and laptops. It enables you to share data as effectively as possible between multiple stakeholders."
Learn more about Trimble Connect Business Premium on our website