Abstract
The out-of-plane vulnerability of perimeter walls is one of the main issues in the seismic response of historic masonry structures. Their dynamic behaviour is highly non-linear and is influenced by the discontinuous nature of the material. A range of failure modes may occur, such as onset of a mechanism, leaf separation, disaggregation, or sliding. Simplified approaches based on rigid-block dynamics may be unconservative, especially for poor-quality masonry, which is typical of a large proportion of our built heritage. Distinct element method (DEM), in which masonry is modelled as an assembly of discrete blocks and zero-thickness joints, appears suitable to simulate the dynamic response of masonry structures. In this work, DEM is used to analyse the out-of-plane bending response of two masonry walls, a two-leaf rubble stone masonry wall and a single-leaf wall in regular tuff blocks. Their seismic behaviour is simulated through non-linear dynamic analyses and compared to shake table test results for validation. DEM provides a good description of the seismic response of the walls, despite the high sensitivity to input parameters (stiffness, friction angle, tensile strength, cohesion and damping), which need to be calibrated in a suitable way.
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Acknowledgments
This work was carried out under the research projects ReLUIS-DPC 2017, “Innovative materials for interventions in seismic areas”, funded by the Italian Dept. of Civil Protection, and “Composites with inorganic matrix for sustainable strengthening of architectural heritage”, funded by the Italian Ministry for Foreign Affairs (2017, 2018 Grant PGR00234).
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Meriggi, P., Pantò, B., De Santis, S., Mordanova, A., de Felice, G. (2019). Distinct Element Modelling of the Out-of-Plane Seismic Behaviour of Masonry Walls. In: Aguilar, R., Torrealva, D., Moreira, S., Pando, M.A., Ramos, L.F. (eds) Structural Analysis of Historical Constructions. RILEM Bookseries, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99441-3_146
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99441-3_146
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