The Earthquake Engineering Online Archive

Cyclic loading tests of masonry single piers, Volume 2 - height to width ratio of 1

Chen, Shy-Wen J.; Hidalgo, Pedro A.; Mayes, Ronald L.; Clough, Ray W.; McNiven, Hugh D.

UCB/EERC-78/28, Earthquake Engineering Research Center, University of California, Berkeley, 1978-12, 188 pages (515/H482/1978/v.2)

This report presents the results of thirty-one cyclic, inplane shear tests on fixed-ended masonry piers having a height to width ratio of 1. These thirty-one tests form part of a test program consisting of eighty single pier tests. A previous report presented the results of fourteen tests of piers having a height to width ratio of 2, and subsequent reports will present the test results of the remaining thirty-five tests. The test setup was designed to simulate insofar as possible the boundary conditions the piers would experience in a perforated shear wall of a complete building. Each test specimen was a full-scale pier 56 in. high and 40 in. wide. Three types of masonry construction were used: hollow concrete block and hollow clay brick, both with 8-in.-wide units, and a double wythe grouted core wall, 10 in. thick, that consisted of two clay brick wythes 3 1/4 in. thick and a 3 1/2 in. grouted core. The other variables included in the investigation were the quantity of reinforcement and the type of grouting. The results are presented in the form of hysteresis envelopes; graphs of stiffness degradation, energy dissipation and shear distortion; and tabulated data on the ultimate strength and hysteresis indicators. A discussion of the test results is presented but no definitive conclusions are offered. These will be included in a final report at the completion of the eighty tests.

Available online: http://nisee.berkeley.edu/documents/EERC/EERC-78-28.pdf (77 MB)