What is "Workable Gage"?

[SaturnVI]

Greetings:
Could somebody tell me what the meaning of workable gage is? I read the description in the AISC steel construction manual and found it too ambiguous to be useful. Is it the width between fasteners along the axis of the beam? Is it the distance from the central web to the fastener? I have no reference to figure it out myself. Thanks.

 

[kslee1000]

I guess you mean "usual gages".

For two vertical bolt rows, the usual gage is the horizontal distance between the center line of the rows.

For vertical bolt row(s) in angle connections (angle-angle, web-angle-web...), the usual gage is the horizontal distance between the center line of the row to the back of the angle (see AISC).

 

[hydtools]

I'm not familiar with AISC, but here is what I found in a quick search.

http://www.modernsteel.com/steelinterchange_details.php?id=60

Ted

 

[hydtools]

Here is another for angle:

http://web2.clarkson.edu/class/ce442/Assignment_3.pdf

Workable gage: distance to allow bolts and washers to 'work' or fit with clearance or sufficient edge distance.

Ted

 

[SaturnVI]

Greetings:
Thanks for the info. I spoke with my boss about this one and found that for a W structural beam, it's actually the distance between 2 fasteners, centered on opposite sides of the web. One of my biggest grips with engineering jargon is how overly wordy and confusing it can be. Oh well.