AI for Tekla Structures: Steel & Concrete Detailing with Claude
"AI for Tekla" now means something concrete: you can drive Tekla Structures with an AI assistant in plain English — create beams, plates, bolts and rebar, produce GA and assembly drawings, run bulk property edits and set up analysis models — without writing a line of C#. This guide shows what that looks like in practice, with real prompts.
What "AI for Tekla" means today
Detailing AI comes in two flavours. One talks about Tekla Structures — it can explain what a cast unit drawing is, but you still do the modeling. The other operates Tekla: places the beam, adds the bolt group, creates the rebar and generates the drawing. The second is the one worth having.
HuskyBIM takes that second approach. It connects Claude Desktop to Tekla Structures through the Model Context Protocol (MCP), using the official Tekla Open API under the hood. You describe a task; Claude picks the tools and the connector runs them on your open model. HuskyBIM for Tekla Structures ships 198 such tools.
What you can genuinely automate
Here are real prompts, grouped by the kind of work they cover.
Create an HEA300 beam in S355 between these two grid intersections, and a contour plate 20 mm thick under its end.Add an M20 bolt circle — eight bolts on a 200 mm diameter — connecting the end plate to the column flange.Create a rebar group of 16 mm bars at 150 mm spacing in this wall, and a circular rebar group in the column.Combine these parts into a cast unit and calculate its pour units.Create a GA drawing of gridline A, then assembly drawings for every assembly on phase 2, and add part marks.Set the user-defined attribute "STATUS" to "Approved" on every part in this selection, in bulk.Check whether the bracing intersects the duct opening zone and color the clashing parts red.Create an analysis model from the selected frame, and add a 5 kN/m uniform load to the roof beams.The recurring patterns are generative detailing (members, plates, bolts, rebar from a description), bulk data edits (UDAs and properties across many parts), drawing production (GA, assembly and cast unit drawings with marks and dimensions), and model QA (intersection checks, coloring, reporting). The repetitive detailing work is exactly what AI handles well.
How it works
The chain is short: Claude Desktop hosts the HuskyBIM extension where you type; the connector — a small local companion — receives Claude's tool calls and executes them through the Tekla Open API on your open model. Everything runs on your Windows machine; Claude Desktop sends your request text and the tool results to Anthropic's models to reason over them, the same as any Claude chat.
Honest limits
- Tekla Structures must be open with a model loaded. The tools operate on the live model; there is no headless mode.
- Windows only, on Tekla Structures 2026.
- Review the output. Generated members and rebar are real model objects — inspect them, and use Undo when a batch isn't right. Work on a copy when trying a new prompt.
- Be specific. Give profiles, grades, spacings and locations explicitly. "Add some bolts" is vague; "M20, 8 pieces, 200 mm circle" is not.
Try AI for Tekla Structures — free
Create a free HuskyBIM account, install the Tekla connector, open your model, and start giving Claude instructions in plain language.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to know the Tekla Open API or C# to use this?
No. You describe what you want in plain language and Claude calls the connector's tools for you. Under the hood every operation runs through the official Tekla Open API, but you never write code.
Can it create drawings, or only model?
Both. Across its 198 tools it models beams, plates, bolts, rebar, assemblies and cast units, and it also produces GA drawings, assembly drawings and cast unit drawings, with part marks, dimensions and annotation.
Which Tekla version is supported?
Tekla Structures 2026 on Windows. The connector installs as a Claude Desktop extension plus a small local companion that talks to your running Tekla instance through the Open API.
Is my model data safe? Where does it run?
The companion runs on your own Windows machine and talks to Tekla Structures locally through the official API. To answer your prompts, Claude Desktop sends your request text and the data the tools return to Anthropic's Claude models, the same as any other Claude conversation.