Strength And Elasticity Of Brick Masonry Prisms

Structural design in masonry requires a clear understanding of the behaviour of the compositeunit-mortar material under various stress conditions.The characteristics of brick masonry are influenced by the properties of bricks and mortar.This study has been investigated in two parts. Firstly, this paper, attempts at studying the properties of brick masonry using different bricks of Turkey with various types of mortars.The strength and elastic modulus of brick masonry under uniform concentric vertical loadshave been evaluated for strong-brick soft-mortar and soft-brick strong-mortar combinations.Various sizes of panels have been tested during these experiments to study the size effect and different bonding arrangements. The failure mechanisms of such specimens have been studied. Attempts are also made to derive empirical relationships for masonry strength as afunction of brick and mortar strength in the Turkey context