Open Access Shear Behaviour of Historic Masonry Made of Clay Bricks

Abstract: Historic masonry walls have demonstrated high vulnerability and low shear capacity when exposed to seismic actions. The behaviour of historic un-reinforced masonry (HURM) walls under combined compression and shear loading plays a fundamental role in the seismic verification of masonry buildings. Experimental investigations on historic ma-sonry were carried out by the author on shear walls and triplets built with full clay bricks in scale 1:3 rd to establish the shear behaviour of HURM walls. On the basis of experimental research, a shear criterion for HURM has been assumed. It appears that the shear strength of masonry increases with the pre-compression up to a limit and becomes constant at higher pre-compression. Finally, the experimental load-deflection relationship and cracking distribution along the surface of the shear walls have been compared with the theoretical results obtained by a non linear FE analysis of HURM walls and a good co-relation was found between them