ABSTRACT
Infill walls contribute to lateral stiffness mortar used, reinforcements, type of junction with
and resistance of buildings they stuff. These the frame members, etc.
variations of rigidity and strength are dependent
on the mechanical properties of the material used Because of the complexity to take into
for the infill and also on the interaction existing account the infill effect on the frame behavior, many
between this last and the frame. In this work, researches have attempted at simplifying the
masonry like infill walls were modeled by using modelling of the infill effect on the frame response
the equivalent diagonal strut concept in order to by introducing simple analytical models. Extensive
asses their involvement in seismic resistance of experimental investigations were used to identify
regular reinforced concrete building. Pushover these approximate models. In this context, infilled
analysis was performed by means of ZeusNL steel frames were studied at first. On the basis of
software package. Various scenarios of infilled experimental evidence showing that detachment of
frames that include weak story arrangements at the frame from the infill occurs, Holmes [1] has
different storey levels were considered. proposed replacing the panel by an equivalent
Comparison between complete infilled building, diagonal strut made of the same material as the infill
partially infilled with a weak story and bared and having a width equal to 1/3 of the infill diagonal
buildings was performed. The obtained results length. Based on experimental investigation on
have shown that infill walls have considerable diagonally and laterally loaded square infilled steel
effect on the lateral stiffness and resistance of frames, Stafford Smith [2] has subsequently
reinforced concrete buildings when subjected to developed furthermore the idea of an equivalent strut
the static equivalent seismic loads. It was found as suggested by Holmes, and provided a numerical
also that infill enhances seismic performance. procedure to evaluate its dimensions.
This enhancement is however largely affected by The procedure proposed in [2] for the
the distribution of infill through the building evaluation of the geometrical dimensions of the
stories. The soft storey mechanism was found to equivalent strut that represents the stiffening effect
be more severe when the bared storey is located of the infill is nowadays well accepted. It was found
in the inferior part of the building. For non to be sufficient in many situations, in spite of
infilled higher stories an unusual equilibrium neglecting some mechanical aspects of the infill-
state can be reached showing very high lateral frame interaction [3-5]. Other refined models that
resistance. embody the effect of infills walls can be found in the
literature [7-10].
Keywords - masonry infills, reinforced concrete The equivalent strut characteristics are
buildings, seismic performance, pushover, identified according to Mainstone model [9] and
equivalent diagonal strut used after that for pushover analysis of the infilled
frames, where all the walls are replaced by their
1. INTRODUCTION equivalent diagonal struts. ZeusNL [11] software
It is well known that infill walls enhance package is employed in this analysis. The objective
the lateral behavior of the frames they fill up. In is to assess the influence of infills on seismic
common situations, the infill stiffens the frame capacity of buildings. A four-storey three-bay
laterally by an order of magnitude and increases its reinforced concrete building will be studied and the
ultimate strength to very high values. These weak-story effect investigated.
variations of stiffness and strength are dependent on
the mechanical properties of the material used for 2. EQUIVALENT STRUT MODELS FOR
the infill: masonry, concrete blocs, reinforced INFILLED FRAMES
concrete, etc. The interaction between the frame and In FEMA 273 [6], FEMA 306 [7] and
the infill wall is also strongly affected by the FEMA 356 [8] it is suggested that the stiffness of the
extension of the infill in the frame. It is also infills is represented in the structural model by
influenced by the ratio between the horizontal and equivalent diagonal struts based on the work of
vertical applied loads and the infill characteristics: Mainstone [9]. The equivalent strut width is given
by
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Sabri Attajkani, Abdellatif Khamlichi, Abdellah Jabbouri / International Journal of
Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 1, January -February 2013, pp.1178-1183
nonlinear concrete model with constant active
H2 L2
w 0.201 Ef Ic H0.1 (1) confinement modelling (con2), Fig.2. This enables
H0.4 Ed ssin(2)
0.1
accurate uniaxial concrete behaviour description
with where a constant confining pressure is assumed in
order to take into account the maximum transverse
H
tan 1 (2) pressure from confining steel. This is introduced on
L the model through a constant confinement factor,
where s is the actual infill thickness that is used to scale up the stress-strain relationship
in contact with the frame, d the diagonal length of throughout the entire strain range. To enter this
the infill, E d is the Young modulus of the infill concrete model during simulations, four parameters
along the diagonal, E f the Young modulus of the are required: compressive strength f c , tensile
reinforced concrete, H and L are the height and the strength f t , crushing strain co and confinement
length of the frame, and H and L are the height factor k .
and the length of the infill as shown in Fig.1, finally
Ic is the entire inertia moment of the cross-
sectional area of the column.
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Sabri Attajkani, Abdellatif Khamlichi, Abdellah Jabbouri / International Journal of
Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 1, January -February 2013, pp.1178-1183
is specified by the user and is incrementally confined part of the beam Hc 600mm , effective
increased. The loading applied as well as the width of the compressed span B 1250mm , width
deformations of the other nodes are determined by
of confined part of the compressed span
the solution of the program.
Bc 1200mm , width of the beam b 300 mm and
4. PRESENTATION OF THE CASE STUDY width of the confined part of the beam bc 250mm .
A reinforced concrete building consisting Table 2 gives the steel reinforcements bar sections
of a regular framed structure having four stories and and their positions on the transverse beam sections.
three bays is considered. The inter-storey height is
3m , the bay length is 4m . Fig.4 shows the portal
frame which is equivalent to this building when
subjected to static lateral equivalent loading along
the most adverse seismic direction.
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Sabri Attajkani, Abdellatif Khamlichi, Abdellah Jabbouri / International Journal of
Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 1, January -February 2013, pp.1178-1183
fc 10 106 Pa , f t 1.1 106 Pa , co 0.001 and
k 1.02 .
(7a)
(7f)
2.5E+05
2.0E+05
1.5E+05
1.0E+05
5.0E+04
0.0E+00
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8
Roof drift (m)
(8a)
(7d)
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Sabri Attajkani, Abdellatif Khamlichi, Abdellah Jabbouri / International Journal of
Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 1, January -February 2013, pp.1178-1183
3.5E+05 3.5E+05
3.0E+05 3.0E+05
Base shear (N)
2.5E+05 200x200 second storey; (d) bared third storey; (e) bared fourth
300x300
2.0E+05
400x400
storey and (f) completely infilled frame
1.5E+05
Fig.8 and Fig.9 show that infill has always
1.0E+05
a benefit effect of the lateral seismic behavior of the
5.0E+04 portal frame as the obtained capacities are always
0.0E+00 higher independently of where the infill has been
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 placed. As this can be seen from Fig.8b, if the first
Roof drift (m) storey is not infilled, then there is no need to seek
(8c) enhancing the seismic behavior of the building, by
inserting infills in the upper stories. Also, as seen
3.5E+05 from Fig. 9a, if the infill quantity is not enough, only
100x100 insignificant changes will be observed on the
3.0E+05
200x200
300x300
capacities independently from where the weak
Base shear (N)
2.5E+05
400x400 storey exists. The infill will affect in this case only
2.0E+05 the initial stiffness and insignificant variations
1.5E+05 appear in the lateral capacity.
1.0E+05
1.0E+05
5.0E+04
8.0E+04
0.0E+00
Base shear (N)
3.0E+05
0.0E+00
Base shear (N)
5.0E+04 1.2E+05
Base shear (N)
0.0E+00
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 8.0E+04
Roof drift (m) Bared frame
Bared first storey
(8e) 4.0E+04 Bared second storey
Bared third storey
Bared fourth storey
Complete filled frame
0.0E+00
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7
Roof drift (m)
(9b)
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Sabri Attajkani, Abdellatif Khamlichi, Abdellah Jabbouri / International Journal of
Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 1, January -February 2013, pp.1178-1183
2.5E+05 stories should be first infilled and the infill quantity
Bared frame
Bared first storey should be significant.
Bared second storey
2.0E+05
Bared third storey
The obtained results have shown also that
Bared fourth storey some infill configurations with bared stories are
Base shear (N)
0.0E+00 REFERENCES
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7
Rood drift (m)
[1] H. Holmes. Steel frames with brickwork
(9c) and concrete infilling. Proceedings of the
3.0E+05
Institute of Civil Engineers 1961; 19:473-
478.
2.5E+05
[2] B. Stafford Smith. Behaviour of the square
2.0E+05 infilled frames. Journal of Structural Div.
Base shear (N)
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