Experimental and Numerical Assessment of
Experimental and Numerical Assessment of
Experimental and Numerical Assessment of
Research Article
Abstract: The behavior of solid brick masonry is presented under the application of lateral loads. Two frames
made of reinforced concrete, bare frame and masonry infilled frame, were subjected to displacement controlled
lateral loading. Experimental tests and numerical modeling were performed, and the results compared show
a good relationship. The analysis results match very well with the experimental observations. For numerical
modeling of the infill wall, a modified micro-modelling approach is selected where the head and bed joints
are lumped into the bricks and an interface model was defined between these bricks representing the behavior
of the mortar joint. Appropriate material models and damage criteria are employed for each mode of failure.
A parametric study was then performed to assess the influence of different material properties on the lateral
load capacity of the RC frame infilled with masonry. It was demonstrated that for the same gravity load level
the enhancement of brick unit properties enhances the total capacity of the RC frame with infill. Similarly,
by increasing the gravity load on the structure with the same brick unit properties, the lateral load capacity
increases considerably.
Received: May 02, 2021; Accepted: June 24, 2021; Published: June 30, 2021
*Correspondence: Syed Azmat Ali Shah, Centre for Disaster Preparedness and Management, University of Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,
Pakistan; Email: engrazmatalishah@uop.edu.pk
Citation: Shah, SAA, A. Ahmed, K. Shahzada, S.M. Ali, A.N. Khan and A. Gul. 2021. Experimental and numerical assessment of masonry infill
on seismic performance of RC frame structure. Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 40(1): 24-36.
DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.17582/journal.jeas/40.1.24.36
Keywords: Experimental testing, Numerical modeling, Infill, Brick masonry, RC frame, Simplified micro-modeling
Introduction the use of the structure. These structural units are very
common in some countries prone to earthquakes like
100
dimensions in mm (inch).
75
50
Test setup and instrumentation
Displacement (mm)
25
-100
on the frame through a girder mounted on top frame -125
beam. A second actuator was used to induce lateral Loading Cycle
Figure 10: Material Model for Brick Element (Pukl et Figure 11: Geometry details of Isoparametric brick
al., 2001). element (Pukl et al., 2001).
The same interface element was used for connecting Comparison of experimental vs numerical results
brick units with the adjacent RC frame. The backbone curve was drawn from the Hysteresis
curves (Figures 6 and 7) and compared to the results
Meshing, loading and solution parameters obtained from numerical modeling values. Figure 15
A 3D micro modeling of masonry with geometric shows the comparative results of the bare frame for
characteristics equal to those confirmed in the both the experimental testing as well as numerical
laboratory (Figure 14) was adopted using FE software modelling. The numerical results obtained show good
(Atena 3D) that had employed the material model relation with the experimental results.
adopted. The iterative method of Newton-Raphson
was employed to solve the numerical equations. 60
The loading was simulated by imposing a constant 50
Lateral Load (kN)
vertical load and a monotonic lateral displacement.
The assessment of monotonic and cyclic testing 40
consequences proposes that the loading protocol is not 30
significant if one is concerned about the load capacity of
the structure. Since the main purpose of the numerical 20
modeling was to perform the parametric analysis of 10 Experimental Results
the experimentally tested frames to understand the Numerical Modeling Results
0
behavior regarding its lateral load response. Thus, the
0 20 40 60 80 100 120
assumption was considered valid and only monotonic
Displacement (mm)
loading was applied while calibrating the model and
also in the parametric analysis. The displacements Figure 15: Results comparison of bare frame.
were imposed in small steps (displacement of 1 mm
per step), with linear variation and uniform growth. Figure 16 shows the comparative results obtained
for RC frame with infill wall from experimental
testing and numerical modelling. The initial stiffness
of numerical curve matches with experimental one
up to a load value of 40 kN however, after that the
numerical model shoes a relatively less stiff behavior.
Similarly, the maximum lateral load for numerical
model occurs at a displacement of 18 mm, while that
of experimental one occurs at 37 mm. The lateral load
resistance of numerical model starts decreasing after
20 mm but on the other hand, it increases up to 38
mm for the experimental model and starts reducing
after that. Also, the post peak (softening) path of
both the curves differ up to some extent, with the fact
that numerical model stops at a displacement of 88
mm and lateral load of 84 kN while the experimental
model reaches 100 mm displacement with lateral load
of 110 kN. It is seen that the proposed model can
detect the key aspects of the tested behavior of the
walls. The damage mechanism and load-deformation
Figure 14: Simplified micro modeling approach. diagrams are partially well replicated.
June 2021 | Volume 40 | Issue 1 | Page 31
Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences
160 infilled frame. After the agreement of the results of
140 experimental and numerical models, a parametric
study was performed to check the effect of different
Lateral Load (kN)
120
100 parameters by keeping the boundary conditions and
80 frame dimensions similar to the originally tested
60 frame.
40
20 Experimental Results Parametric study
Numerical Modeling Results Numerical model of the parametric study
0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 In parametric study, the properties used for steel and
Displacement (mm) concrete as well as the geometry of the assembly were
Figure 16: Results comparison of infilled frame. kept the same, since the main objective was to evaluate
the influence of masonry infill wall on the response of
Figure 17 shows the comparison of the damage RC frame structure. Therefore, the material properties
pattern of the infilled frame by experimentally testing of brick units were changed to see their effect on the
and numerical modelling. The damage pattern follows behavior of the structure.
the actual damage pattern of the system very much.
However, the crack formation in the panel indicates 400
the same damage pattern and predicts the same stress 350
Lateral Load (kN)
concentration point as obtained from lab tests as well 300
200
150
100
50
0 kN 78 kN 156 kN 234 kN 312 kN
0
4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Brick Compressive Strength (MPa)