Study on overstrength and ductility of reinforced concrete building with different infill through nonlinear analysis

Abstract

The building structure with infill wall shows higher global stiffness along with the uncertain behaviour during 2015 Gorkha earthquake. It significantly increased the collapse rate of structures during earthquakes. The response of buildings with different infills during seismic excitations is not completely accounted by current seismic codes in the region. On the other hand, due to the different geological region, availability of infill materials for reinforced concrete building also differs on region to region. In most of the situations the burnt clay brick, concrete blocks and stone block are used as infill materials during building construction. In this scenario, this study explores the importance of selection of right infill material for better seismic performance during earthquakes. For this, building constructed at Pokhara Metropolitan City is considered for case study. The structural model is prepared with and without considering infills. The solid, hollow concrete block and clay brick masonry are taken as infill material during analysis. The structural behaviour during earthquakes is studied with non-linear static pushover. The result shows that the hollow concrete block masonry infill (INHB) shows better structural performance compared to other infill types.