Giuseppe Brandonisio

Restoration Through a Traditional Intervention of a Historic Unreinforced Masonry Building “Palazzo Scarpa” in Naples

A challenging retrofit intervention, through traditional methodology, on an existing unreinforced masonry building “Palazzo Scarpa” is illustrated. Especially challenging was the complete substitution of the two storeys of two existing longitudinal walls, each long 20m, for a total of 30 piers, by leaving in place the three upper storeys due to need of not evacuate the 36 families living in the building. The diagnosis phase demonstrated an unacceptable low value of the safety factor of the structure under gravity loads. Vertical cracking in several walls, due to compression stresses, confirmed this worrying safety condition of the masonry structure. The paper demonstrates the feasibility (technical and economical) of very traditional intervention, completely based on real mechanical insertions: the substitution walls and the mechanical steel ties. In 2007, the interventions illustrated in this study won the first prize of Sisto Mastrodicasa award on restoration and strengthening of buildings.

Seismic Behavior of some Basilica Churches after L’Aquila 2009 Earthquake

In this paper the seismic response of four church buildings in the l’Aquila April 2009 earthquake is analyzed. The buildings are: St. Giusta church, St. Maria di Collemaggio Basilica, St. Silvestro church and St. Pietro di Coppito church. The analyses are carried out by employing a “two-step” procedure suggested by the authors and already applied to similar case studies. The first step consists in three-dimensional linear analysis, while in the second step, two-dimensional non-linear analyses of macro-elements are carried out. The results coming from the two-steps, allow for understanding the observed damage and for approximately assessing the seismic level of the building.

Structural Analysis of the Basket Dome in the Chapel of the Holy Shroud by Guarino Guarini

ABSTRACT This article provides the structural analysis of the basket dome in the Chapel of the Holy Shroud, designed by Guarino Guarini in 1667. The dome is characterized by two structural systems: twelve massive ribs and thirty-six elliptical arches, organized in six superimposed levels. A FE brick model, analyzed considering both a linear and a nonlinear material constitutive law, was compared with a simplified model consisting of beam elements. Further analyses were carried out on simplified models, in order to clear up the roles played by arches and ribs. On this issue, the existent studies on the Chapel do not provide always the same interpretation: some references state the ribs as only load-bearing system of the dome, while others give to the arches a leading role. The paper provides a significant contribution, assigning a specific role to both elements by means of observational, historical and numerical analyses.

Design of Functionally Graded Beam of Aluminium Foam for Civil Structural Application

Sandwich foam beams, made of solid skins and aluminium foam core, are usually applied in high-tech engineering field while they are not yet adopted in civil structures. An initial, explorative study on the structural application of metal foam is presented in this paper. The potentials of sandwich foam beams are studied through analytical models and parametric analyses; the sensitivity of the flexural response of the media to the total amount of pores and their spatial distribution are investigated. An analytical tool able to design functionally graded beams of metallic foam is presented and applied with reference some commercial aluminium foams. An experimental campaign is being planned to validate the presented results.