Giancarlo Marcari

Ecosmart Reinforcement for a Masonry Polycentric Pavilion Vault

In the cultural life of modern societies great importance has acquired the preservation of existing and, in particular, ancient architectural heritage. With the inherent historical aspects, the economic implications have to be taken into account as well. Indeed, especially European cities and countries receive significant economic advantages by the existence of monuments and ancient suburbs. In this context, structural maintenance, strengthening and monitoring has gained an important academic and professional impulse. The present paper aims to present the results of a real scale experimental work regarding the application of an innovative seismic retrofitting technique for masonry walls and vaults by Hydraulic Lime Mortar strengthened by Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer textile grids (HLM-GFRP) embedding new sensing systems as fiber optical sensors. The real scale specimen is a masonry polycentric pavilion vault that was damaged during the L’Aquila earthquake of April 2009. The need of eco compatibility of bonding material with masonry support implies the use of HLM-GFRP as strengthening system. On the other hand, the use of Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) has a large number of advantages in opposite to electrical measuring methods. Example are: small sensor dimensions, low weight as well as high static and dynamic resolution of measured values, distributed sensing feature allowing to detect anomalies in load transfer between reinforcement and substrate and the location of eventual cracking patterns. A suitable Finite Element (FE) model is developed both to assess the effectiveness of the HLM-GFRP strengthening layers in retrofitting of the masonry vault and to define the strain field essential to the design of the FBG sensors network.

Shear seismic capacity of tuff masonry panels in heritage constructions

Tuff masonry structures have been built since old times in countries located in the Mediterranean areas; they represent a significant part of the existing masonry building inventory of Central-South Italy, including historical architecture. Due to a lack of knowledge in relevant strength and deformability parameters for tuff masonry, experimental and numerical analyses concerning their shear response are certainly of interest. The present paper focuses on single and multiple-leaf tuff masonry walls under various in-plane loading conditions. Experimental displacement-controlled results on large specimens have been used to calibrate finite element (FE) numerical models. A macro-modelling approach is used, which is specifically based on a composite plasticity model under plane stress conditions. Comparisons between numerical and experimental results are provided. The ability of the proposed model to fit the overall performances of tuff panels is thus demonstrated. Additional and relevant information about the relation between mechanical parameters of tuff masonry and the corresponding seismic capacity are given for safety assessment and retrofit design purposes.