Pre-Engineered Buildings and Pre Engineered Metal Buildings came into existence in the 50s and '60s to represent standardized 'off-the-shelf', low-rise industrial building designs, which were very popular due to their economy and speed of construction.

The designs were ready-made but the building components were either ready-made or manufactured against specific orders. These buildings were pre-designed or 'pre-engineered' into standard sizes, spans, bays and heights, and used standard details for fixing cladding, roofing, gutters, flashing, windows, doors etc taking advantage of industrial practices to mass produce components economically.

Pre-engineered and pre-fabricated space frame and steel structures offer significant advantages over conventional structures.

Lightweight
Steel structures offer a significantly higher strength to weight ratio over conventional RCC beam slab or plane truss and purlin configuration.

Stable Configuration
Steel structure can be designed as space frames to have a tree-dimensional interconnecting pattern can 'redundancy', which permits substantial redistribution of force. This redundancy prevents catastrophic failure of the structure. Members meeting at a joint rigidly hold every "node" of a steel structure in space. The nodes in turn brace the member ends. External loads are radiated homogeneously through the members in all direction.

Speed of Construction:
Speed of construction of st eel structures far exceeds any conventional systems thus reducing interest costs and increasing operational revenues.

Column Free Space
Space Frame structures provide larger column free spaces. This is ideal for applications such as machine shop floors where freedom of materials movement is necessary, in theatres and indoor stadia/grandstand roofs where unobstructed view is critical. It allows for flexibility in process planning and machinery layout, unobstructed views and layout of rooms.

Flexibility: Space Frame structures are highly flexible since they can be easily extended or dismantled and can have almost random locations for supports. This allows the designer greater flexibility in choosing the layout and positioning of columns. It is possible for some columns to be removed or have their position modified without damaging the structural integrity of the frame.

Integrated services
Space Frames provide a natural deck for HVAC and other services without burdening the structure with additional framework for supporting the above. A ready framework for fixing false ceiling is available at no additional cost.

Speed of Construction
The speed of construction far exceeds any conventional system reducing thereby financial costs such as interests and other operational costs. This also means early production schedules.

Accuracy and speed in erection
Double-layer grids can be assembled with pre-fabricated elements, which are precisely made in jigs, ensuring accuracy and speed in erection. The small size of the components greatly simplifies handling, transportation and erection. The dry method of construction allows the erection of double-layer grid structures during virtually any type of weather.

Fire Resistance
Analysis and tests show that double-layer grids have a much greater fire resistance than conventional structures. Hence they are ideal for high-risk industries such as chemicals and textiles.

Blast Resistance
Experience shows that double layer grids resist aerial or terrorist attacks and explosions much better than any other structural system. They also resist horizontal earthquake forces better.

Aesthetics
The regular pleasing pattern of double layer grids provides an extremely attractive appearance, which becomes a valuable feature in many architectural applications. False ceilings can be eliminated and the structure can be left exposed.

Range of Roofing and Cladding
Space Frame structures can be clad with a wide range of materials such as aluminum, steel, asbestos cement sheet, glass, polycarbonate sheet and pre-cast concrete etc.

Range of Finish
Pre-fabricated space frame components can be finished with a wider range of shop finishes as well as the normal in-situ finishes.

Economy
Space Frame structure provides overall economy for larger spans and/or heavy loads, when compared to equivalent conventional structures such as RCC beam-slab roofs. Pre-fabrication and mass production can ensure faster construction and lower costs.