PRO-SIS
Policy objective: PO1 - A more competitive and smarter Europe by promoting innovative and smart economic transformation and regional ICT connectivity
Specific objective: SO1 - Developing and enhancing research and innovation capacities and the uptake of advanced technologies
Typology: Capitalization project
As part of the "CONSTRAIN" project, intervention strategies for reducing the seismic vulnerability of existing masonry buildings were developed and their effectiveness verified through a significant experimental campaign. Basically, the proposed strategies make it possible to obtain significant reductions in seismic vulnerability with interventions carried out from outside the buildings, without requiring the movement of people and things inside the buildings, with significant savings in economic terms but above all in terms of discomfort for people.
- This results in significant financial savings, but more importantly, it makes the intervention much more occupant-friendly. In the proposed project, we intend to develop a design methodology or guidelines and apply it to actual buildings that are planned for seismic retrofitting. The analytical and numerical procedures will be validated and calibrated on the investigations already carried out in the CONSTRAIN project.
The initial phase of the project involved the two universities on the development and calibration of original algorithms. These algorithms will allow the designers to quantify the effectiveness of the intervention strategies that were experimentally studied in the "COINSTRAIN" project. The activity, which is still in progress, involved the collection and analysis of the results of experimental tests relating to masonry piers, spandrels, and out-of-plane bending on walls. These analyses are fundamental for the definition and calibration of mechanical response models for the analytical estimation of the reinforcement performances. The first results of the numerical models were used to further validate the developed analytical-mechanical model and applying it to different structural configurations.
After careful calibration, the detailed numerical analysis of the stone masonry pier performed using the Abaqus SIMULIA software, showed an almost perfect correlation with the experimentally observed behavior. The correlation concerns both the structural damage, with the formation of a predominantly diagonal crack, and the capacity curve.
Fig.1 – Numerical simulation of the stone masonry pier: damage pattern and capacity curve
Calibrated models allow to perform parametric analyses, which replace typically more expensive experiments and provide new results faster and more cost-effectively.
Simultaneously, efforts are underway to define and analyze benchmark examples of wall configurations of increasing complexity. These examples serve as a basis for applying simplified modeling criteria and establishing analytical-mechanical correlations. Simplified numerical models make use of the equivalent frame method and/or equivalent multilayer planar elements, to evaluate the performance of walls and whole buildings. The activity also involves the companies Fibre Net and ZRMK for the comparison of the results obtained with different commercial software, which require different modeling strategies.
Fig.2 – Esempi di alcuni elementi e configurazioni strutturali valutate col metodo analitico-meccanico e con i modelli a telaio equivalente
Fig.3 – Comparison of the results between the analytical-mechanical model and the analysis with the equivalent frame: uniform compression on piers equal to 0.1 MPa (a), 0.3 MPa (b) and 0.5 MPa (c).
Finally, partners conducted research on potential case studies for the future application of the proposed reinforcement strategy. In Italy, a complex of social housing buildings has been identified, managed by ATER Udine, which date back to the 1950s. These buildings represent a significant part of the constructions built at the time, as they were built to a design by the Ministry of Public Works. In Slovenia, the partners have carried out an inspection of the De Belli building in Koper and are considering further proposals pending a final decision.
