your favorite references
 

your favorite references
hey everyone. i was wondering what your favorite structural reference/textbooks are? especially for steel and reinforced concrete.. i will be graduating from college next year and am trying to begin a nice collection of quality reference books. thank
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for concrete - wang & salmon's "reinforced concrete design" is great (harper and row publ)
for steel - salmon and johnson's "steel structures - design and behavior"
i have found the aisc manual of steel construction to be as useful as any reference book. the basic beam diagrams and formulas are all grouped together. other chapters have good info on connections, bolts, beam unbraced length, etc. take your choice of asd or lrfd. (i prefer asd as more general purpose, but accept that lrfd may save money for a "green field" project and seems to be the wave of the future.)
another general purpose publication to consider would be asce 7 for loading criteras. maps & charts show expected wind, seismic, snow, etc. around the usa.
thanks for your replies. i already have the lrfd manual, and i will be picking up jae's suggestions as well. i think i may get the asd manual as well since, from what i've heard, most of the firms in my area still use asd almost exclusively. thanks again and any other suggestions would be helpful..
a wise old engineer advised me to do this when i started out 18 years ago...
get a big three-ring binder, and anytime you run across some useful information, put it in there. items such as magazine articles, calculations from other engineers, formulas, etc. you'll be surprised how often you'll refer to this in your career. i have several binders now that are organized for concrete, steel, wood, etc.
cscottflanagan - i'm up to four binders in 20 years. i call them my "cheat books".
that's a great thing to do... personal references will always be more helpful/familiar than any book...