How reliable is Element Design inSTAAD?

[Noopur]

While designing plate elements in STAAD....I have noticed that.....I always (80 % of the time) get area of steel required to be.....0.324 sqaure inch/foot.
I tried differently....but I get same results.
For example....
I changed thickness of plate element from 12" to 15".
I increased the load (uniform pressure) from 1.5 ksf to 5 ksf.
But though the moment and stresses get changed.....the reinforcement comes out to be the same.

Can anybody explain .....this to me?
How reliable is element design in STAAD?
Is 0.324 is the minimum steel required?

I tried modeling 2D slabs, 3D boxes (walls of a tank or manhole) using plate elements.

I don't know how accurate are the results I am getting?
Can anybody can give a look to my STAAD file?

please help.

 

[msajjadh_imported]

Noopur, My experience is that there are bugs in element design. It seems that the steel ratio is minimum. Send me your input data file.
Thanks,

 

[Noopur]

Msajjadh,
Thanks a lot for your comments.Can you please give your Email ID, So that I can send you my input file!
Regards,
Noopur

 

[edward1]

Noopur, STAADPRO and previously STAAD-III checks the moment
on the plate to see if the minimum of .0018bh meets the moment requirement. You can check this out by increasing the load until you get > .324 in2/ft.

 

[edward1]

Noopur, When modeling flat slabs I have found it is better to use
UNIT FT
SUPPORTS
joint numbers FIXED BUT MX MY MZ KFZ 800
instead of
joint numbers PINNED