Engineering Space-Efficient Frameworks

The first problem was sizing steel beams to fit within the floors, which after subtracting the ceiling components and the floor components (radiant in floor heating of course) we had about 16 inches of total depth plus bolts of about another inch or so.  This was the easy part, because we also needed to fit a fully ducted air-conditioning system within this space plus piping for the domestic water and storm water risers.

The solution was to cut the steel webbing and run all this through the beams as there was no space to go over or under them.  The openings were all reinforced with welded steel plates.