Steel Building Design — Structural Engineering, Drawings & Building Steel Design Services

For a standard single-span building, we need: building use type, plan dimensions (clear span width, length, eave height), site country and city, applicable design standard preference, and crane specification or confirmation of no crane. With these inputs, our engineering team delivers an initial structural layout drawing and a detailed price proposal within 3 business days. For multi-bay, crane-integrated, or cold storage buildings, the brief requires additional parameters confirmed at a short requirements intake call before committing to a turnaround time.

Yes. Our engineering team regularly produces structural drawings and calculation reports to EN 1993 Eurocode 3, AISC 360, and AS/NZS standards, in addition to GB. The applicable standard is confirmed at requirements intake and applies to all load combination calculations, member capacity checks, and connection design outputs. If your project is in a market with a specific local standard variant, confirm the version at the start of the project so our engineering team can confirm scope before work begins.

KAFA provides the structural engineering content — calculations, load assumptions, member sizes, and connection details — produced to the specified international standard. In most African and Southeast Asian jurisdictions, permit submission requires drawings to bear the stamp and signature of a locally registered professional engineer. KAFA’s drawings provide the technical basis for that local engineer review. The local registration and stamp are the client’s responsibility to arrange. We have worked with clients in Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, the Philippines, Vietnam, and other markets who have used our drawing sets as the technical foundation for local engineer review and permit approval.

The 3-business-day commitment applies to standard single-span portal frame buildings where the structural configuration is straightforward and all required input parameters are confirmed before we begin. For buildings with overhead crane systems, mezzanine floors, multi-bay layouts, cold storage envelope specifications, or non-standard configurations, the timeline is confirmed at requirements intake. The 3-day count begins when all required inputs are confirmed — incomplete parameters delay the design start, not the design clock.

For projects where design leads directly into a confirmed fabrication order with KAFA, structural design, layout drawings, 3D model, shop drawings, erection drawings, and BOM are included in the project scope — design is part of the fabrication package, not a separately invoiced service. For design-review engagements, feasibility assessments for unusual structural configurations, or design work for projects not fabricated by KAFA, a scoping discussion with our engineering team is required to confirm engagement terms before work begins.

When design and fabrication are handled by separate organisations, the structural drawings must be interpreted, converted into shop drawings, and validated by the fabricator before production begins. This secondary detailing step introduces both time and the possibility of discrepancy between what the structural engineer specified and what the fabricator produces. When KAFA handles both design and fabrication, the shop drawings our engineering team produces are the same drawings our production floor uses to manufacture every member. There is no secondary interpretation step, no second detailing cycle, and no handoff gap between design intent and fabricated output.

To design a steel building, you need to confirm three things before structural drawings can begin: building use type (warehouse, workshop, office, cold storage, etc.), plan dimensions (clear span width, building length, and required eave height), and site location (country and city, which determines wind zone, snow load, and applicable design standard). With these three inputs confirmed, KAFA’s engineering team can produce an initial structural layout drawing and a detailed price proposal within 3 business days. You do not need to know crane specifications, door configurations, or insulation requirements at the outset — those are confirmed during the design process. If you have a project footprint and an intended use, that is enough to start.

Steel structure building design covers the full engineering process from structural brief to fabrication-ready drawing set: primary frame sizing (column and rafter sections), secondary member selection (purlins, girts, bracing), connection design and detailing, foundation anchor bolt plan, load calculations to the specified standard, and shop drawings for every fabricated member. KAFA produces all of these in-house using Tekla Structures for 3D modelling, SAP2000 for structural analysis, and AutoCAD for 2D drawing output. The complete design output is a drawing set that goes directly to our production floor — no secondary detailing or third-party conversion is required.