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Seismic Performance Assessment of Ductile Reinforced Concrete Block Structural Walls

This dissertation is relevant to structural engineers focusing on seismic design of structures using reinforced masonry. Specifically the thesis focuses on the seismic performance of reinforced masonry shear walls as seismic force resisting systems. / Reinforced masonry (RM) has been gaining a wide acceptance in the low- and mid-rise construction market as an economic and durable structural system. However, challenges still exist in the area of seismic design because of the poor performance of unreinforced masonry during recent earthquake events in Iran 2003, Haiti 2010, Japan 2011, New Zealand 2011 and Nepal 2015. The dissertation investigated the seismic performance of six concrete block structural walls in an effort to evaluate their force-, displacement- and performance- based seismic design parameters. The walls fall under the ductile shear wall/special reinforced wall seismic force resisting system (SFRS) classification according to the current North American masonry design standards. More specifically, the dissertation is focused on evaluating if such walls, designed under the same prescriptive design provisions, having different cross-section configurations would possess similar seismic performance parameters. This was established through an experimental and analytical program by subjecting the walls to a displacement controlled quasi-static cyclic analysis. Different wall configurations were tested including, rectangular, flanged and slab-coupled walls. Test results confirmed that walls designed under the same SFRS classification, but with different configurations, have different seismic performance parameters that included ductility capacity; yield and post yield displacement; stiffness degradation; period elongation and equivalent viscous damping. The current North American masonry design provisions do not account for such difference in the ductility capacities between the walls. The thesis analyses were concluded by quantifying the seismic vulnerability of a RM SFRS comprised of shear walls similar to those tested, through the development of collapse fragility curves and the assignment of an adjusted collapse margin ratio, ACMR following the FEMA P-58 and P-695 guidelines. The system were deemed acceptable since the ACMR was greater than ACMR10% (2.35 > 2.31). Therefore, the selected RM SFRS which was designed to meet the prescriptive requirements of the ductile masonry walls classification of the CSA S304 (CSA 2014), shows potential capacity against collapse under high intensity earthquakes in one of the highest seismic zones in western Canada and it should be considered as a viable SFRS to be used in seismic design. The procedure described in the chapter can be adopted to investigate the collapse fragility of other SFRS in different seismic regions through careful selection and scaling of the ground motion records associated with such region's seismicity. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:mcmaster.ca/oai:macsphere.mcmaster.ca:11375/18501
Date06 1900
CreatorsSiyam, Mustafa
ContributorsEl-Dakhakhni, Wael, Drysdale, Robert, Civil Engineering
Source SetsMcMaster University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis

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