The problem of scale in design-implement experiences in civil engineering

Engineering knowledge has been subject to software development for decades. Software opens the door for new kinds of multi-disciplinary collaboration between architects and structural engineers. Software gives architects access to specialist knowledge and engineers can test and compare many more solutions faster because of the software. But simulations of e.g. structural behaviour must be based on real-life experience of the effect of forces and of various structural concepts or they will lead to errors or processes and designs that are too costly. Design-implement experience for students of civil engineering poses a special challenge because of the large scale involved in civil engineering. The dilemma is defined by cost on the one side and on the other by the need for the design implement experience to grasp issues of real civil engineering. The paper describes how the testing of scale models and fragments of structures is problematic, and how a chain of design implement experiences can be arranged to lead up to a reflective use of digital simulation as a professional tool. ts.