Shear strengthening of unreinforced masonry (URM) walls with FRP composites

In this dissertation, strengthening of masonry walls with near surface mounted (NSM) FRP bars was studied. A methodology for the computation of the nominal shear strength of URM walls strengthened by structural repointing provided a reasonable and conservative fit with the experimental data. An experimental program was carried out in order to study the effectiveness of NSM FRP bars on improving the structural behavior of URM walls with a central opening. The main parameter investigated was different strengthening schemes. A discrete finite element model, based on an engineering simulation software named ANSYS, was used to analyze the test results and good agreement was achieved. --Abstract, page iv