Monorail Crane Beam Bolted Connection to Side of Header Beam

[Gart888]

I'm designing a monorail beam for a monorail crane. Crane capacity is 5T, span between supports is 25'. I've spec'd a W14x61 beam. Originally, the beam was to be mounted on top of header beams at each end. Unfortunately, these header beams are already in place and are too high for the monorail beam to sit above. I'm also told that the monorail beam can't hang below the header beams (bolted to their bottom flanges) because this wouldn't provide enough headroom under the monorail's hoist.

This leaves me with attaching a W14 beam to the side of another W14 beam. What's the best way to go about this for a crane application?
Should I be adding an end plate to my monorail beam, boxing in the side of the header beam, and having a bolted connection there? What are the torsional implications on the header beam if it's loaded on one side like this?

Or would I be better off coping the top and bottom flanges of the monorail beam and using a fin plate (or angles) connection welded to the header beam and bolted to the monorail beam?

Thanks!

 

[Agent666]

Might be a question thats best asked of the fabricator/erector as I'm sure they would have a preference related to welding at height vs bolting, etc.

Regarding the torsional implications, just a matter of assessing the assembly for any torsions that result, but the end plate solution is no worse than say an extended fin plate in terms of the torsion going into the header beam.

Personally if the mono rail beam can tolerate having the copes (lack of restraint to the flanges, lesser loadpath for horizontal perpendicular loads) I'd look at bolting everything with clip angles, even bolting through the web of the header beams to avoid any welding at height. Alternatively a heaver shallow beam retaining the flanges could also be an option if the copes were undesirable.

An alternative that might work if you can swing the beam in is to have end plates on each end, and shims to the web to reduce the eccentricity associated with connecting to the edge of the flanges with the boxing out to the edge of the header beam flanges.