The purpose of this study is the improvement of the behaviors of walls constructed with masonry bricks using reinforced plaster mortars. In this study,400×400×100 mm sized walls were constructed using 1 : 2 scaled100×50×30 mm sized masonry bricks. The walls were plastered using normal and various proportions of polypropylene and steel fiber reinforced plaster mortars and were subjected to vertical loads at 30°, 45°, 60°, and 90° angles. As a result of the experiments, attempts were made to present the strength, stiffness, and ductility of all of the walls. At the end of the study, an evaluation concerning failure envelope curve (σ-τ) obtained from test results according to plastered masonry walls types was performed.

A method based on a variational procedure in conjunction with a finite difference method is used to examine the free vibration characteristics and steady-state response to a sinusoidally varying force applied orthotropic elastic rectangular plate carrying masses. Using the energy-based finite difference method, the problem reduced to the solution of a system of algebraic equations. Due to the significance of the fundamental natural frequency of the plate, its variation is investigated with respect to the mechanical properties of the plate material, the translational spring coefficient of the supports, the mass distribution, the mass locations and the quantity of mass. The steady-state response of the viscoelastically supported plates was also investigated numerically for the damping coefficient of the supports and the force distribution in addition to the characteristics of the plate system. Many new results are presented and the validity of the present approach is demonstrated by comparing the results with other solutions based on the Kirchhoff-Love plate theory.

The analysis of moment-curvature relationship of reinforced concrete sections is complex due to large number of variables as well as non-linear material behavior involved. Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) are found to be a tool capable of solving such problems. This has led to increasing use of ANN for analyzing the behavior of reinforced concrete sections. This paper reports the details of a study conducted using ANN for predicting moment-curvature relationship of a reinforced concrete section. Using data generated based on the analytical solutions, the ANN model was trained. The trained model was tested for a different set of input parameters and the output values were compared with the values based on analytical results. The agreement was found to be good.

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Chapter 7 of the 2007 Turkish Earthquake Code (TEC) entitled "Assessment and Strengthening of Existing Buildings" sets standards for assessment and rehabilitation of existing buildings. Linear elastic and non-linear evaluation procedures of 2007 TEC are applied to reinforced concrete buildings. 2007 TEC gives two methods for assessment and rehabilitation of existing buildings. Linear elastic and non-linear static evaluation procedures are proposed for structural evaluation. A performance-based evaluation methodology is used under three levels of earthquake ground motion intensities with different return periods. The performance acceptance criteria are based on demand to capacity ratios at critical sections for the linear evaluation procedures (equivalent seismic load method and mode superposition method) and material strains for the non-linear evaluation procedures (the non-linear static pushover analysis). Member performance limits are described for three damage levels, considering the anticipated failure mode and ductility capacity of each member. Structural performance is then calculated by accounting for the distribution of member damages over the building.. Consistency between the results of the methods used for seismic evaluation of existing buildings is of prime importance. For this purpose, an irregular structure of in plane (A3 type) and 3 story is considered. The target performance level of the building is obtained by applying the linear and the non-linear evaluation procedures. The results are given comparatively on the target performance level of the building. Furthermore non-linear procedure results are compared between 2007TEC and FEMA-440 Capacity-Spectrum Method (CSM) and Displacement-Coefficient Method (DCM)

The topic of this study is to strengthen cracked beams with prefabricated RC rectangular cross-sectional plates. The damaged beams were repaired by epoxy based glue. The repaired beams were strengthened using prefabricated RC rectangular crosssectional plates. The strengthening plates were bonded to the bottom face of the beams by anchorage rods and epoxy. The strengthened beams were incrementally loaded up to maximum load capacities. The experimental results were satisfactory since the load carrying capacities of damaged beams were increased approximately 47% due to strengthening. The post-elastic strength enhancement and the displacement ductility of all the beams are researched during the experiments. The experimental program was supported by a three-dimensional nonlinear finite element analysis. The experimental results were compared with the results obtained from the beam modeled with ANSYS finite element program.