Seismic Performance Enhancement of Unreinforced Brick

Masonry Buildings by Retrofitting with Reinforced

Concrete Bands: Full Scale Experiments
Lakshmi Latha 1; Samit Ray-Chaudhuri 2; Suparno Mukhopadhyay, A.M.ASCE 3;
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and Kunwar K. Bajpai 4

Abstract: This study was aimed to conduct a thorough experimental investigation on the seismic performance of semiconfined unreinforced
brick masonry (SC-URBM) building as a structural topology. Experiments were conducted on two identical full-scale single-story brick
masonry buildings: one is completely unreinforced (URBM), and the other is retrofitted with semiconfining horizontal and vertical reinforced
concrete (RC) elements (SC-URBM). Both buildings were subjected to FEMA 461 specified reverse slow-cyclic quasi-static loading protocol
to quantify the improved seismic performance of the SC-URBM building compared to the URBM building. From the experimental results,
ductility capacity, load carrying capacity, and energy dissipation capacity were evaluated, along with important observations such as failure
mechanisms from prepeak to postpeak regimes. The results and observation from the experiments demonstrate that the semiconfining
elements significantly enhance the energy dissipation capacity and ductility of the retrofitted SC-URBM building without compromising
its strength, thereby implying the superior performance of such buildings in comparison to URBM buildings. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)
ST.1943-541X.0003460. © 2022 American Society of Civil Engineers.

Introduction structures (ElGawady et al. 2004; Bhattacharya et al. 2014; Messali

Unreinforced brick masonry (URBM) constructions form a signifi-
cant portion of the entire spectrum of structural constructions
around the world. The seismic response of the existing URBM
buildings and the need for improvements in their seismic perfor-
mance are of great concern. This is because URBM constructions
do not provide adequate seismic performance and the seismic risk
associated with such existing structures is very high. There are
many factors that influence the seismic behavior of URBM build-
ings such as the geometry of the building, connection between
walls, lateral stiffness, and nonstructural elements present (Murty
et al. 2012). The seismic response of in-plane loaded walls is al-
ways of major concern since they form the primary path for load
transfer. Combinations of in-plane and out-of-plane damage may
also occur, causing damage to the corners, roof, and connection
between floor diaphragms and walls and often resulting in partial
or even total collapse of the structure (Lizundia et al. 2016).
Different conventional strengthening techniques have been pro-
posed so far to improve the seismic performance of existing URBM
1
Ph.D. Scholar, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Tech-
nology Kanpur, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh 208016, India. Email: lakshmia@
iitk.ac.in
2
Professor, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology
Kanpur, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh 208016, India (corresponding author).
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0009-6201. Email: samitrc@iitk.ac.in
3 2000; Brzev 2008). In particular, both vertical and horizontal RC
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of
Technology Kanpur, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh 208016, India. Email: suparno@
iitk.ac.in
4
Principal Scientific Officer, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute
of Technology Kanpur, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh 208016, India. ORCID:
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7141-230X. Email: kunwar@iitk.ac.in
Note. This manuscript was submitted on September 29, 2021; ap-
proved on May 13, 2022; published online on September 23, 2022. Dis-
cussion period open until February 23, 2023; separate discussions must be
submitted for individual papers. This paper is part of the Journal of
Structural Engineering, © ASCE, ISSN 0733-9445.
et al. 2017). Some studies have considered the use of steel or fiber-
reinforced mortar/concrete coating and engineered cementitious
composite overlays (Facconi and Minelli 2020; Lucchini et al.
2021; Koutromanos et al. 2013) for strengthening masonry infill
walls. Stainless steel reinforcing bars and high-strength steel cords
have also been found to be useful for stabilizing and improving
masonry wall performance (Corradi et al. 2018; Borri et al. 2019).
For load-bearing masonry structures, Indian standards [IS 4326
(BIS 1993); IS 1893 (BIS 2002); IS 13935 (BIS 2009)] suggested
RC elements and corner reinforcement for improving the seismic
performance in the absence of the relevant Indian standards for
confined masonry (CM) constructions.
Over the years, CM constructions have emerged to address the
drawbacks of unconfined masonry and become an alternative for
low-cost constructions (Brzev 2008). The main components of
CM constructions include masonry walls (that act as gravity as well
as lateral load-resisting system) and the confining elements. The
confining elements do not require significant reinforcement and
rigorous detailing, unlike reinforced concrete (RC) frame construc-
tions. As a result, the cost and labor involved in CM constructions
are significantly less compared to RC frame constructions. With the
superior merging of load-bearing walls and confining elements, it
has been found that significant improvement in the structural
behavior of CM constructions can be achieved, especially in terms
of strength and ductility (Aguilar et al. 1996; Yoshimura et al. 1996,
(confining) elements accommodate the load transfer after the ma-
sonry panel reaches its maximum capacity, thus averting a sudden
disintegration of the walls.
Studies have also been carried out for understanding the perfor-
mance of CM under cyclic lateral loads (Tomazevic and Klemenc
1997; Yoshimura et al. 2003; Zabala et al. 2004; Aguilar et al.
1996; Meli 1973; Marinilli and Castilla 2004; Kumazawa and
Ohkubo 2000; Meli et al. 2011; Chourasia et al. 2016; Cruz and
Perez Gavilan 2021; Borah et al. 2021; Marques et al. 2020;

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J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195

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Fig. 1. 3D realization of semiconfinement of internal and external
walls of a typical SC-URBM building with RC elements.
Hidalgo-Leiva et al. 2021). From these works, it was concluded that
CM systems perform better than conventional URBM systems. For
CM wall panels, the common failure mode was found to be the
initial flexural failure followed by the shear failure. A distribution
of cracks was observed in masonry walls during the shear failure
mode. The vertical RC elements however found to resist the devel-
oped stresses, thus resisting a sudden collapse of the structure
(Tomazevic and Klemenc 1997). Also, unlike in URBM buildings,
the out-of-plane failure or overturning of the panel was not com-
monly observed in CM buildings. Instead, the two-way arching
mechanism (reducing the strength of out-of-plane walls) was ob-
served (Meli et al. 2011; Brzev et al. 2010).
Although CM constructions have been proven to provide supe-
rior seismic performance, retrofitting an existing URBM building
to behave as a CM building remains unpopular due to various
reasons. It may be noted that any retrofitting method for existing
masonry constructions needs to be economic, reliable, minimally
intrusive, and can be adopted in a quick manner. Further, these
methods need to be simple and convenient so that local masons
can be trained quickly.
The objectives of this work are to consider a retrofitting scheme
for the semiconfinement of existing URBM buildings in order to
enhance the seismic performance and to experimentally investigate
the effectiveness of the scheme through full-scale tests. The semi-
confinement scheme was developed to provide a better integral
action of the confining elements and load-bearing masonry walls.
In this scheme, horizontal and vertical semiconfining (SC) RC
elements/bands are considered at strategic locations for improving
seismic performance. The locations of SC elements are considered
in such a way that these bands (1) do not hinder the critical sections
of wall-like corners, (2) provide maximum confinement to all wall
surface areas, and (3) create SC panels with aspect ratio approxi-
mately close to unity (∼1). Fig. 1 represents a 3D rendering of the
URBM building retrofitted with RC horizontal and vertical ele-
ments (henceforth termed as SC-URBM building). The scheme is
different from that of CM constructions in a sense that, in SC-
URBM constructions, the confining elements do not run through
the entire width of the wall. Rather, these bands are constructed on
both faces of an existing wall and connected by tie rods to provide a
composite action, as shown in Fig. 2. The proposed SC-URBM
constructions essentially provide some confining action to the
© ASCE 04022195-2
J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195
Fig. 2. Elevation and vertical section of an SC-URBM building.
masonry wall. Although similar strengthening schemes have been
suggested for good construction practice [IS 4326 (BIS 1993);
IS 1893 (BIS 2002); IS 13935 (BIS 2009)], as per the authors’
knowledge, no systematic experimental investigation has taken
place to evaluate the lateral load-resisting capacity and ductility
capacity of such retrofitted buildings. The proposed scheme is en-
visioned to be suitable for low-rise buildings of regular/irregular
geometry, which are particularly constructed with weak mortars
such as those commonly found in India and neighboring countries.
The proposed scheme may prevent the sudden collapse of buildings
even during major earthquakes.
The in-plane failure modes of SC-URBM buildings may be gov-
erned by shear or flexural failure mechanisms depending on the
anchorage of the semiconfining elements, vertical load on walls,
and aspect ratio. The flexural failure mechanism is governed by hori-
zontal cracking at mortar bed joints present on the tension side of the
walls. There can be extensive cracking at vertical semiconfining
elements. The location of vertical bands and effective anchorage of
vertical semiconfining elements to both roof and foundation may fur-
ther influence the rocking behavior. In shear behavior, the dowel
action effect may be provided by the vertical elements. The develop-
ment of flexural cracking at the corners under tension reduces the
resisting section of a wall and may be followed by shear sliding fail-
ure of the wall. The shear failure mechanism of a wall may also be
characterized by distributed diagonal cracking. This failure is due to
loss of bond at the interface of mortar-brick and can also be due to
tensile cracking of masonry units. The horizontal and vertical bands
can resist the formation of such diagonal cracking and thus have been
adopted in the proposed scheme.
Scope of This Study
An experimental investigation has been carried out in this work
with two full-scale one-room identical buildings, one unreinforced
(URBM building), and the other retrofitted with the aforemen-
tioned semiconfining elements (SC-URBM building). Slow-cyclic
lateral loading tests have been performed on both buildings to
evaluate the in-plane behavior of the masonry walls under the same
simulated gravity loads. The loading history is considered as per
FEMA461 (FEMA 2007) such that the buildings tend to give
the deformations as experienced under earthquake excitations. In
particular, the emphasis is given to understand the hysteretic behav-
ior, strength, ductility, energy dissipation, stiffness degradation,
and associated failure mechanisms, so as to quantify the influence
of semiconfining solution in the in-plane behavior of the masonry
J. Struct. Eng.
 walls with a particular layout of the vertical and horizontal
semiconfining elements. It should be noted that the study presented
herein does not consider the out-of-plane inertial effects.
Experimental Program
Description of Masonry Buildings
Both masonry buildings were constructed at the Structural Engi-
neering Laboratory of IIT Kanpur by the same skilled mason fol-
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lowing common construction practices prevalent in India. Brick
units used for the construction were Class A type bricks [IS 1077
(BIS 1992a)] as commonly used for housing construction and pro-
cured from a reputed local source. At first, the brick units were
verified to comply with dimensional control, since it affects the
overall strength of a masonry building. It may be noted that often
the bricks available in the market come with significant variation in
dimensions and warping. As per [IS 1077 (BIS 1992a)], it is essen-
tial to ensure the bricks are of good quality including dimensional
(a)
(b)
Fig. 3. Schematic diagram of (a) plan of both masonry buildings; and (b) details of section S-S’ (all dimensions in mm).
© ASCE 04022195-3
J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195
control. Dimensional control is an important aspect as bricks with
significant variation in dimensions will require different mortar
thicknesses at different locations of the wall and thus, such a wall
will have variation in the masonry strength as compared to the
situation where better dimensional control is achieved.
Two identical solid full-scale single-story masonry prototypes
were built in the same manner. Both buildings have a plan with
exterior dimensions of 3,900 mm by 4,500 mm, and a clear height
from base to roof slab of 3,000 mm. Two openings, one window
and one door, as shown in Fig. 3(a), were provided to simulate a
one-room living unit. Walls for the buildings are designated using
alphanumeric symbols IP1, IP2, OP1, and OP2, respectively, as
shown on the plan of both buildings in Fig. 3(a) for better clarity
of presentation. The subscript IP represents parallel in-plane walls
and OP represents parallel out-of-plane walls, while the numeric
symbols correspond to the in-plane and out-of-plane wall number-
ing. Further, IP1_e, IP2_e, OP1_e, and OP2_e are used to denote
the exterior surfaces of the walls, while IP1_i, IP2_i, OP1_i, and
OP2_i are used for the interior surfaces of the walls, for both the
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Fig. 4. Schematic diagram of SC-URBM building with horizontal and vertical RC bands at strategic locations (all dimensions in mm).
URBM and SC-URBM buildings. The buildings were cast on rec-
tangular RC strip footings on the laboratory’s strong floor. Each
footing was anchored to the strong floor using 12 bolts of 70 mm
diameter (in shoulder) and made of high-strength steel (tensile
strength: 1,040 N), as shown in Fig. 3(a). Fig. 3(b) shows a sec-
tional elevation of the building, highlighting the various vertical
dimensions. As can be seen from Fig. 3(a), with OP1 and OP2 in
elevation, discontinuous lintel beams were provided just above the
door and window levels, as is the common practice in nonengi-
neered URBM buildings found in India (Sinha and Brzev 2002;
Kaushik et al. 2006).
The reinforcement details of the floor and roof slabs have been
shown in Fig. 3(b). The detailing, including geometry and configu-
ration, of the SC-URBM building after semiconfinement is shown
in Fig. 4. The sequence of construction works followed for both
building preparation is shown in Fig. 5. The buildings were con-
structed side-by-side, followed by the placing of the precast roof
slabs. Concrete blocks were placed on the top of both buildings
for simulating live load as per relevant Indian standards [IS 875
(Part 2) (BIS 1987)].
Strengthening Scheme Adopted for SC-URBM Building
The strengthening scheme adopted with the RC bands for the
SC-URBM building is discussed in this subsection. The details
of the construction scheme of the SC-URBM with vertical and hori-
zontal RC bands are illustrated in Fig. 6. At first, grooves of size
50 mm × 50 mm were cut on both the inner and outer faces of the
walls, as shown in Fig. 6(a). Since the wall thickness was about
230 mm, even after cutting the groves, the remaining portion of
the wall of size 130 mm was enough to provide stability at the con-
struction stage. On each groove, one 12 mm dia high yield strength
deformed {HYSD, Fe500, [IS 1786 (BIS 2008)]} steel bar was
placed centrally, and these bars were tied on both faces through
8 mm tor bars at a spacing of around 500 mm. Since a 50 mm ×
50 mm groove was adopted considering ease of constructability
using the electric groove cutter, the diameter of the steel bar was
selected to provide a minimum clear cover (∼19 mm) within the
available groove size after placing the steel bar in the middle of
© ASCE 04022195-4
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the groove. Cementitious microconcrete [Renderoc RG of M/s
Fosroc, (Fosroc 2019)] was then poured into the grooves, with
wooden plyboard shuttering, to create the RC bands. Figs. 6(b–d)
illustrate the placing of steel bars, subsequent shuttering, and mi-
croconcreting process, respectively. A horizontal RC band was pro-
vided throughout at 0.5 m below the roof slab, i.e., in between the
roof level and window sill level. Similarly, a horizontal band was
provided throughout at 0.5 m above the top of the foundation,
as shown in Fig. 4. The vertical RC bands were provided at some
specific distances on the walls IP1 and IP2 (i.e., walls with no open-
ing), along the direction of the loading in order to create an approx-
imately square confined panel. Also, for the walls OP1 and OP2
(i.e., walls with one opening), the vertical bands were provided
in a way to get the maximum horizontal size of the confining
element considering the openings as shown in Fig. 4. The horizon-
tal bands are provided continuously through walls considering
the door opening and are also tied on both faces through 8 mm
{Fe 500 bar [IS 1786 (BIS 2008)]} bars, as discussed earlier.
All the vertical RC bands were connected to the roof and base slabs
by extending the grooves to the roof slab and the foundation,
although a full anchoring mechanism was not ensured. The full an-
choring mechanism may not be feasible for houses considered in
this work. The buildings considered for this retrofitting scheme
usually have a layered brick foundation and a nominal plain cement
concrete floor slab, where a proper anchoring may not be possible
without adding external anchor blocks or a similar mechanism
(which may not be feasible and economical). So, in this case, the
simple approach of drilling holes on the slab and extending the
bands was targeted.
Material Properties
The details of the material properties used in the construction are
provided in this subsection. The masonry buildings were con-
structed using solid clay burnt bricks, and mortar with a cement-
to-sand ratio of 1∶6. As one can notice, the chosen mortar represents
a weak mortar for constructing masonry buildings. The purpose of
choosing such weak mortar is to mimic the prevalent practice in
commonly constructed nonengineered masonry buildings in rural
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Fig. 5. Sequence of construction works: (a) side-by-side construction of URBM and SC-URBM buildings; (b) placing of roof slab; (c) test buildings
prepared for URBM and SC-URBM (with grooves for RC bands); and (d) final test buildings for both URBM and SC-URBM.

and suburban areas of India. The physical properties of masonry,
constituent materials, and strengthening materials were evaluated
following relevant codal provisions. The average compressive
strength of the six mortar specimens was found to be 6.87 MPa
as per ASTMC109 [ASTM C109/C109M-11b (ASTM 2002)].
Table 1 provides the average test results of six pieces of brick units,
showing that the brick units follow Class A type brick as per Indian
Standard. The water absorption and compressive strength tests of
brick units were conducted as per IS 3495 (Part 2) (BIS 1992c) and
IS 3495 (Part 1) (BIS 1992b).
In order to understand the composite behavior of masonry walls,
several other tests were conducted as per the relevant standards and
literature. These include the prism test, tension bond test, and
diagonal tensile test. Table 2 provides the average test results of
six masonry sub-assemblages for the prism [IS 1905 (BIS 1998)]
and diagonal tensile tests (ASTM 2007) and the average of nine test
results for the tension bond test (Khalaf 2005). One can notice that
the compressive strength of the masonry prism is about 4.18 MPa,
while the Young’s modulus is about 1.24 GPa (COV 28%). The
secant modulus of elasticity at 75% of the ultimate compressive
strength of the masonry (usually considered between 40% and 75%
of the ultimate maximum compressive stress) is evaluated from the
stress-strain curve and the average value is reported as Young’s
modulus. Further details about experiments can be found in Singhal
and Rai (2014). Overall, the masonry sub-assemblage is weak in
tension, as is commonly known.
Experimental Set-Up and Loading System
The experimental program involved slow-cyclic tests of both
URBM and SC-URBM masonry buildings in the Pseudo Dynamic
Testing Facility of the Structural Engineering Laboratory, IIT
Kanpur. Displacement-controlled reverse cyclic loads were applied
laterally at the roof level of both buildings with the same boundary
conditions. The buildings were loaded with 1,000 k-N/500 mm
stroke MTS servo-hydraulic actuators connected to the roof slabs
of the buildings and the strong (reaction) wall of the testing facility.
The details of the connection with the roof slab were done in such a
way that the load is transferred uniformly over the slab for both
loading and unloading sequences. The loading system used for
the testing is as shown in Figs. 7(a and b). A steel beam section
is used for load transfer, and the loading arrangement with the steel
beam section is further attached to steel plates for transferring load
to the masonry roof slab.
Instrumentation and Data Acquisition System
The instrumentation system adopted for the slow-cyclic testing of
both masonry buildings is shown in Fig. 8, and further details are

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Fig. 6. Strengthening procedure adopted for SC-URBM building: (a) URBM building with 50 mm × 50 mm groove for RC bands; (b) building
with 12 mm dia HYSD bars in the groove and tie rods at a spacing of 500 mm; (c) shuttering for microconcreting; (d) SC-URBM building after
microconcreting with RC bands (on both sides); and (e) zoomed view of A.

Table 1. Geometric and mechanical properties of bricks shown in Fig. 9. In addition to the MTS actuator embedded with
Brick units (225 mm × 105.2 mm × 70.2 mm) Average values load cell and displacement transducer, linear variable differential
transformers (LVDTs) and wire potentiometers were used to mea-
Density (kg=m3 ) 1,885.49 (COV 3%)
Water absorption (%) 11.6 (COV 8.3%)
sure horizontal displacement and diagonal movement of the walls,
Compressive strength of bricks (MPa) 23.5 (COV 9.1%) respectively. As shown in Fig. 9, 10 LVDTs were used for the front
wall (wall OP1), 5 on each side of the wall. The purpose of putting
these LVDTs was to observe: (1) the deflection profile along the
Table 2. Results of masonry sub-assemblages test height of the wall, (2) if there is any slip between foundation and
wall, or between wall and roof slab, and (3) if there is any twisting
Masonry sub-assemblage tests Average values
or horizontal asymmetric movement developed due to application
Compressive strength (MPa) 4.18 (COV 9.3%) of the load. In the backwall (wall OP2), only one LVDT was used
Tension bond strength (MPa) 0.56 (COV 28%) at the roof level to measure the displacement in the middle of the
Diagonal tensile strength (MPa) 0.11 (COV 9.3%)
roof slab. In addition to the LVDTs, four wire potentiometers

(a) (b)

Fig. 7. Schematic diagram of (a) loading system used for testing; and (b) loading arrangement in the plan.

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 (WP0, WP1, WP2, and WP3) were used on both side walls (IP1
and IP2), i.e., the walls along the direction of loading, as shown in
Fig. 9. The purpose of these sensors were to measure the interstory
drift between the foundation and roof slab on the walls along the
loading direction. All the sensors used were of reputed make
(https://measurementsensors.honeywell.com/). Data from all sen-
sors were collected using a National Instrument (www.ni.com) data
acquisition system. In addition to these measurement sensors, high-
resolution images and videos were collected during the tests.
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Loading Protocol
For testing the buildings, the loading history was adopted as per
FEMA 461 (FEMA 2007), which is suitable for the testing of hys-
Fig. 8. Global instrumentation system adopted.
teretic systems. Fig. 10(a) represents the loading history adopted

SC-URBM d6-LVDT_MIDDLE_SLAB
WALL-IP1

URBM
WALL-OP2

SC-URBM
URBM
WALL-OP1
WALL-OP1

URBM URBM
WALL-IP1
WALL-IP2

Fig. 9. Instrumentation system adopted in detail.

15 60

10 40
Displacement (mm)

Displacement (mm)

5 20

0 0

-5 -20

-10 -40

-15 -60
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 0 2000 4000 6000
(a) Time (Seconds) (b) Time (Seconds)

Fig. 10. Recorded loading history for: (a) URBM; and (b) SC-URBM buildings (as per FEMA 461).

© ASCE 04022195-7 J. Struct. Eng.

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 for the URBM building. A predetermined pattern of slow-cyclic
displacements with increasing amplitudes was applied to the test
buildings. For the SC-URBM building, the loading history fol-
lowed is shown in Fig. 10(b). For both buildings, the loading
was applied at a very slow rate, ranging from 0.5 mm=min for early
cycles to 1 mm=min for later cycles, in order to optimize the testing
time while not missing any significant damage/failure modes. The
smallest deformation amplitude of the loading history is ensured to
be safely smaller than the amplitude at which the lowest damage
state is observed. The initial displacement amplitude of 0.5 mm was
repeated for 10 loading cycles to get a better understanding of
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behavior in the elastic range and also to ensure the working of
all instruments and sensors properly. Then, the experiment was
continued with two loading cycles for each amplitude of 1 mm,
2 mm, 3 mm, etc., as per FEMA 461 (FEMA 2007). One can notice
however that for the URBM building, the testing was stopped ear-
lier in comparison to the SC-URBM building. The reason for this is
explained in the next section.
Results and Discussions
Hysteretic Behavior
Figs. 11(a and b) represent the roof displacement versus actuator
force for the URBM and SC-URBM buildings, respectively. From
these plots, it is evident that both buildings demonstrated a linear
behavior at the initial stage. Once the force level reached the yield
force, both buildings started showing nonlinear hysteretic behavior.
For the URBM building, the experiment was stopped at around
12 mm roof displacement (i.e., about 0.4% roof drift ratio). This
is because a large block slip pattern (along with cracks in the cor-
ners and flexural cracks in the transverse walls) was observed that
was seemingly posing a global failure mechanism, and the building
appeared to be on the verge of failure due to an imminent out-of-
plane wall failure. For the SC-URBM building, the test was stopped
at a roof displacement of about 50 mm (1.7% of roof drift ratio).
The building was still carrying the load without any significant
reduction of strength. The test on the SC-URBM building was
stopped as there was complete separation of the building from the
base due to the rocking motion/partial uplifting of the building and
no increment of the load was observed. Overall, one can conclude
that the SC-URBM building was able to provide much better hys-
teretic performance compared to the URBM building. The details
of failure modes, energy dissipation, and ductility are provided in
the following subsections.
200
100
Actuator Force (kN)
URBM
0 0
Envelope Curve
-100
-200
-60 -40 -20 0 20
(a) Roof Displacement (mm)
Fig. 11. Force-roof displacement behavior and envelope curve obtained from slow-cyclic tests on: (a) URBM building; and (b) SC-URBM building.
© ASCE
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Observed Failure Modes
Major crack patterns observed in walls of both URBM and SC-
URBM buildings have been represented in Figs. 12 and 13, respec-
tively. The pictures of the crack patterns at ultimate displacement
are shown in Figs. 14 and 15, from both inside the room (interior
view) and outside the room (exterior view). The crack progression
for both buildings at the initial stages followed similar behavior.
Initially, flexural cracks were formed at the base of both buildings
and propagated along the loading direction. For the URBM build-
ing, the flexural cracking was followed by tension cracks at the top
of the in-plane wall and then by horizontal cracks on the out-of-
plane wall, suggesting an imminent out-of-plane wall failure due
to the extension of cracks. On the other hand, for the SC-URBM
building, no major crack was observed in its masonry blocks
between the roof and window sill levels for both in-plane and
out-of-plane walls, as shown in Fig. 13. Subsequently, the building
started rocking motion under cyclic loading. The failure observed
in both masonry buildings is discussed in detail in the following
paragraphs.
For the URBM building, horizontal flexural cracks appeared
along the bed joint at the heel of the exterior of the IP1 wall, which
then progressed in a stepped fashion. A similar type of failure was
initiated on the interior side of the same wall on the reversal of
lateral load. The flexural tensile cracking developed at the heel
and then propagated to the toe. Initially, a small amount of finite
flexural tensile strength (provided by the bed-joint mortar) was
dominating the crack over the walls to resist shear forces. However,
this flexural strength was poor, and as a result, the wall cracked
under tension. Tension cracks were observed in a stepped fashion
on the IP2 wall, which initiated at the roof slab to the IP2 wall
connection, where the strength reduction as a result of cracking
may be small and may exhibit ductile response. The horizontal
cracks progressed to out-of-plane wall OP2 as well, where the door
opening is provided near the wall corner, and this actually hindered
the flow of force from one wall to the other. The opening of cracks
through the joints over the door lintel can also be seen in Fig. 12 for
the interior of the OP2 wall (OP2i ). There was no transfer of load
because of opening, and as a result, vertical cracks at IP2 and OP2
wall intersections were observed. Loss of connection between IP2
wall and OP2 wall was also seen since vertical cracks were devel-
oping between the IP2i wall and the OP2i wall, as seen in Fig. 12.
Further, the loss of connection between wall and roof slab was ob-
served too. Since the mortar was weak and the crack in the in-plane
wall was not perfectly horizontal (creating a perfect horizontal slip
surface), it was felt that the failure of the out-of-plane wall is
200
100
Actuator Force (kN)
SC-URBM
Envelope Curve
-100
-200
40 60 -60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60
(b) Roof Displacement (mm)
04022195-8 J. Struct. Eng.
 OP2_i~
12mm

IP1_e IP1_i
~5 mm ~7 mm IP2_e
~ 12 mm

IP2_i
~ 12mm
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OP1_i
~ 10mm

OP2_e
OP1_e ~ 10mm
OP2_i
~ 8 mm ~ 12mm

Fig. 12. Major crack pattern observed in URBM building.

Rocking observed for SC-

URBM building
IP1_i
IP1_e ~ 12 mm
~5 mm

IP2_i~
20 mm

No major
crack
No major OP2_e
crack OP1_e ~30 mm
~ 25mm

IP2_i
~50 mm
OP2_~
50mm

Fig. 13. Major crack pattern observed in SC-URBM building.

imminent if the displacement level was to be increased further. The the IP1 wall, which then again progressed in a stepped fashion.
test was therefore stopped for the URBM building at this stage. A similar type of failure was initiated on the interior side of the
For the SC-URBM building also, initially, horizontal flexural IP1 wall on lateral load reversal. Extensive cracking was observed
cracks appeared along the bed joint at the heel of the exterior of at the bottom of the sill level in the masonry panels of all walls till

© ASCE 04022195-9 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195

Downloaded from ascelibrary.org by "Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur" on 09/29/23. Copyright ASCE. For personal use only; all rights reserved.

(a) (b)

Fig. 14. Crack pattern observed for the (a) interior; and (b) exterior walls of URBM masonry system at ultimate displacement.

(a) (b)

Fig. 15. Crack pattern observed for the (a) interior; and (b) exterior walls of SC-URBM masonry system at ultimate displacement.

the SC-URBM reached its maximum capacity. Further damage was
observed at the end of the vertical bands since the band provided
resistance against further crack propagation. So, the RC elements
(bands) of the SC-URBM suffered damage by resisting the further
developed stresses and holding the wall, while the walls continued
to undergo deformation. Hence, the initial crack propagation was
followed by rocking at the higher drift levels for the entire
SC-URBM building (Fig. 13). The rocking of the SC-URBM
building seemed to continue until the band got separated from
the foundation due to uplifting. Since the vertical band resisted fur-
ther developed stresses, there were no notable cracks on the ma-
sonry blocks between the roof level and window sill level for

© ASCE 04022195-10 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195

 200
100
Lateral Load (kN)
Lateral Load (kN)
Envelope Curve
ASTM (2011)
IBC (2008)
0 0
-100
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-200
-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60
Peak Roof Displacement (mm)
(a)
Fig. 16. Envelope curve and bilinearization for (a) URBM building; (b) SC-URBM building; and (c) actual and idealized bilinear curve based on
ASTM (2011).
any of the in-plane walls of the SC-URBM building, thus prevent-
ing the out-of-plane collapse even when the door opening was
present at the corner of the OP2 wall. Although vertical bands were
not fully anchored to both roof slab and base slabs for the adopted
scheme, it actually helped to maintain the integrity of the super-
structure to behave as a single unit along with the horizontal bands.
Further, the formation of sliding planes at the concrete-to-masonry
interfaces was not observed. This may be due to the use of
nonshrinkage high-strength concrete, which may have provided
enough frictional resistance at the interface.
Envelope Curves and Bilinearization
Figs. 16(a and b) show the envelope force-roof displacement curves
for both buildings obtained by considering peak load during the
loading and unloading in the first loading cycle corresponding to
every displacement increment value. The strengths attained by the
SC-URBM building are slightly higher than the URBM building.
For the positive loading cycles, these values are 138.9 k-N for
URBM and 157.9 k-N for SC-URBM buildings. For the negative
loading cycles, the corresponding values for URBM and SC-
URBM buildings are 135.4 k-N and 176.3 k-N, respectively.
Experimental force-displacement hysteretic behavior loops were
fitted with envelope curves for both buildings in both positive and
negative directions. The envelope curve was obtained from the
hysteretic force-displacement response by joining the displacement
peaks of the first cycle of each amplitude in both positive and neg-
ative directions. In order to compare the experimental force-
deformation curve with the procedure available in various standards,
bilinear idealization is adopted. This idealized force-deformation
curve is considered to derive the seismic performance parameters
in the subsequent sections. It may be noted that the bilinear curve
is an elastic-plastic curve that yields the same area as that of the
envelope curve till ultimate displacement (Du ). Two different ap-
proaches are considered here to derive the bilinear force-deformation
curves. The procedure of bilinearization for the ASTM (2011) ap-
proach is as shown in Fig. 16(c), which is one of the well-recognized
approaches. In this procedure, the force equal to 0.4 × the maximum
absolute load or peak load, denoted by Fp is considered as the first
cracking load (Fcr ). In the second approach, the bilinearization of
the envelope curve is based on IBC (2008), where the first cracking
load (Fcr ) is assumed at 0.7 × Fp . The idealized bilinear curves
based on both procedures for both masonry buildings (i.e., URBM
© ASCE
200
100
Envelope Curve
ASTM (2011)
IBC (2008)
-100
-200
-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60
Peak Roof Displacement (mm)
(b) (c)
and SC-URBM) are also shown in Figs. 16(a and b), along with the
corresponding envelope curves. It is seen from these figures that both
idealizations are providing almost similar behavior.
Ductility
Ductility ratio (μ) is given by the ratio of the ultimate displacement
(Du ) to the yield displacement (Dy ) from the idealized bilinear
curve as shown in Fig. 16(c). The ultimate displacement (Du ) de-
notes the displacement observed at load drop corresponding to 20%
of Fp or otherwise at the minimum strength degradation, which is
the last data point on the curve. Since the load drop did not exceed
20% of Fp for both URBM and SC-URBM buildings, the last data
point of the envelope curve was considered for the Du , and the cor-
responding load is the ultimate load denoted by Fu. Du is obtained
as 12.53 and 48.85 mm for positive loading cycles, and 12.43 and
48.2 mm for negative loading cycles, for the URBM and SC-
URBM buildings, respectively. For the URBM building, although
strength reduction due to cracking was not observed due to the
ductile pattern of failure mode (flexural cracking followed by ten-
sion cracks in a stepped pattern), sudden out-of-plane wall collapse
was imminent at higher displacement levels as described in the
observed failure modes of the URBM building. From Fig. 16(b),
one can note that the SC-URBM building can sustain much larger
deformations without posing any risk of collapse. In other words,
the ductility capacity (or post-yield deformation) of the SC-URBM
building is significantly higher than that of the URBM building due
to the rocking mode. This behavior was seen even when the bars
were disconnected from the base of the SC-URBM building. In
fact, the overall confining behavior provided the required integrity
to make the superstructure behave as a single unit under the rocking
motion. This is of considerable importance from the seismic design
point of view, as it indicates that the SC-URBM building can dis-
sipate a much higher amount of energy compared to the URBM
building.
Wall Stiffness Degradation
The initial stiffness of a wall is considered as the slope of the
envelope curve defined between the initial loading and the first
cracking load and can be estimated based on the idealization of
IBC (2008) and ASTM (2011). Hence, the initial stiffness is
given by
04022195-11 J. Struct. Eng.
J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195
 K ie ¼ Fcr =Dcr
where Fcr = first cracking load; and Dcr = displacement corre-
sponding to Fcr as shown in Fig. 16(c). These idealizations are used
for practical considerations, even though masonry is an inelastic
material and even for small deformation it does not exhibit linear
elastic behavior. The stiffness degradation in a masonry wall rep-
resents its strength degradation, which occurs gradually during the
loading process by crack initiation and propagation. The effective
stiffness (K eff;i ) was considered using the equation:
ð1Þ performance of the SC-URBM building compared to the URBM
building, as already discussed in the preceding sections. The drift
corresponding to yield displacement, θy , is almost the same for both
buildings, which corresponds to their similar yield displacement
values. However, drift θu , corresponding to ultimate displacement,
is comparatively higher for SC-URBM buildings due to the en-
hanced deformation capacity.
Slab Rotation

jFþ − Although the building was made symmetric along the loading di-
i j þ jFi j
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K eff;i ¼ þ ð2Þ rection, the openings on the transverse walls were asymmetric
jDi j þ jD−
i j along the loading direction. So, in-plane loaded walls had different
where Fþ þ boundary constraints than the out-of-plane loaded walls. To detect
i = peak force with corresponding lateral displacement Di
for positive quadrant; and F− = peak force with corresponding lat- whether the buildings underwent any rotation, the rotation of the
i
eral displacement D− roof slab was estimated based on displacement measurements
i for negative quadrant for any ith loading
cycle. The SC-URBM building has relatively higher initial stiffness by the LVDTs attached to the left and right locations on the slab
[26.5% and 12% increase considering ASTM (2011) and IBC (i.e., the LVDTs d1 and d1’, as shown in Fig. 9). The rotation was
(2008) idealizations] compared to URBM due to the increase in obtained as the difference between these displacement mea-
strength by the incorporation of the confining elements. For the surements divided by the distance between the LVDTs. This slab
effective stiffness, the first stage of the stiffness degradation pattern rotation was computed for the various peak displacement ampli-
is observed to be the same for both buildings Fig. 17. However, the tudes, for both the negative and positive loading cycles. The varia-
SC-URBM building degraded to a much lower value of stiffness tion of this rotation with the corresponding story drift for both the
compared to the URBM building since the walls could undergo URBM and SC-URBM buildings is shown in Fig. 18. It is seen that
deformation even after reaching its strength due to the confining the rotation is slightly more for the URBM building compared to
elements.
Fp , Du , and drift corresponding to Du are listed in Table 3 for
both positive and negative loading cycles. The values of K ie , Dy , μ, Table 4. Bilinear parameters of buildings based on ASTM (2011)
and drift corresponding to Dy , based on ASTM (2011) and IBC Building K ie (k-N/mm) Dy (mm) μ θy (%)
(2008) idealizations, are given in Tables 4 and 5, respectively.
URBM(+) 121.82 0.97 12.92 0.03
The intersection point of two lines of the idealized bilinear
URBM(−) 132.55 1.08 11.51 0.04
envelope is considered, and the displacement corresponding to that SC_URBM(+) 128.69 1.07 45.65 0.04
point is the displacement at the elastic limit state (Dy ) as shown in SC_URBM(−) 217.58 0.81 59.51 0.03
Fig. 16(c). The bilinear parameters obtained based on both ap-
proaches, ASTM (2011) and IBC (2008), illustrate the improved

Table 5. Bilinear parameters of buildings based on IBC (2008)

400
Building K ie (k-N/mm) Dy (mm) μ θy (%)
URBM
SC-URBM URBM(+) 112.59 1.05 11.93 0.03
300 URBM(−) 110.83 1.1 11.3 0.04
Stiffness (kN/mm)

SC_URBM(+) 125.12 1.10 44.41 0.04

SC_URBM(−) 126.92 0.89 54.16 0.03
200

100
0.06
URBM
SC-URBM
0 0.04
0 20 40 60
Rotation (in degrees)

Peak Roof Displacement (mm) 0.02

Fig. 17. Stiffness degradation with lateral displacement, in URBM and 0

SC-URBM buildings.
-0.02

-0.04
Table 3. Peak load and ultimate displacement value of buildings
-0.06
Building Fp (k-N) Du (mm) θu (%) -0.4 -0.2 0 0.2 0.4
URBM(+) 138.90 12.53 0.42 Storey Drift (%)
URBM(−) 135.40 12.43 0.41
SC_URBM(+) 157.90 48.85 1.63 Fig. 18. Variation of rotation with story drift corresponding to peak
SC_URBM(−) 176.30 48.2 1.6 displacement amplitudes.

© ASCE 04022195-12 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195

 2000
URBM
SC-URBM
Dissipated Energy (kNmm)
1600
1200
800
400
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0 0
0 10 20 30 40 50
(a) Peak Roof Displacement (mm)
Fig. 19. Dissipated energy versus peak roof displacement for (a) positive; (b) negative loading cycles; and (c) variation of cumulative dissipated
energy with average values of peak displacement.
the SC-URBM building. In other words, the presence of the RC
elements provided enhanced torsional rigidity to the building. The
SC elements anchored in the roof slab inhibited the shear failure at
the roof-to-wall interface in the SC-URBM building and thereby
reducing the torsional rotation.
Energy Dissipation and Equivalent Viscous Damping
From a seismic design point of view, it is crucial to have a better
energy dissipation capacity for buildings. The energy dissipated for
a particular loading cycle can be calculated as the area enclosed by
the corresponding cycle of lateral load (actuator force) and roof
displacement from the hysteretic load-displacement plot of the
building. The average value of the energy dissipated for all loading
cycles of a particular peak displacement amplitude is considered
here. The variation of the dissipated energy with different peak
displacement amplitudes, both for positive and negative loading
cycles, is shown in Figs. 19(a and b), respectively. The variation
of cumulative dissipated energy with average values of peak dis-
placement obtained for both loading cycles is shown in Fig. 19(c).
There is a linear increase in the energy dissipation for higher
displacement values for both buildings. The energy dissipation
for SC-URBM building is significantly higher compared to URBM
building. URBM building appeared to be posing an imminent out-
of-plane wall failure at this displacement level. On the contrary, the
SC-URBM building behaved like a single unit and dissipated
energy through rocking motion even for the higher displacement
amplitudes.
Since a narrower or wider hysteretic loop does not always help
in identifying how much energy is dissipated as it also depends on
lateral load resistance values, it is also important to compute the
energy dissipation per loop or equivalent viscous damping ratio.
Based on the experimentally observed force-deformation behavior
from the slow-cyclic tests, the equivalent viscous damping ratio is
evaluated for both URBM and SC-URBM buildings for comparing
their performance. The equivalent damping ratio or specific damp-
ing factor is evaluated based on the dissipated energy and strain
energy of the buildings (Chopra 2012). For the corresponding ith
positive and negative loading cycles, the equivalent viscous
damping ratio (ζ eq ) is based on the dissipated energy (Ei ) and
strain energy of (Esi ) of the corresponding cycle and is given as
follows:
ζ eq ¼ ð1=4πÞ × Ei =Esi
© ASCE
2000 30000
Cumulative Dissipated Energy (kNmm)
URBM
URBM
SC-URBM
SC-URBM
Dissipated Energy (kNmm)
1600
20000
1200
800
10000
400
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 0 10 20 30 40 50
(b) Peak Roof Displacement (mm) (c) Average Displacement (mm)
The observed average damping at ultimate displacement is 12%
and 14% in positive loading cycles and 9.5% and 12% in negative
loading cycles for the URBM and SC-URBM buildings, respec-
tively. The higher value of damping for the URBM building is
attributed to the fact that for this building, the damping observed
at higher displacements (10 mm to 12 mm) is higher due to the
extensive damage at those displacements. The testing of the URBM
building was also stopped at that point where the building exhibited
danger of collapse. However, the SC-URBM building could give
the same damping (10%) even for higher displacement amplitudes
(till 19 mm) after initial elastic behavior. In this case, the experi-
ment continued till the ultimate displacement (50 mm) at which the
damping observed was 8%. The SC-URBM building seemed not to
pose a major danger of collapse even at this displacement level. So,
the SC-URBM could give the same damping for higher displace-
ment amplitudes compared to the URBM building, which enhanced
the energy dissipation capacity of the SC-URBM building consid-
erably as shown in Figs. 20(a and b).
Deformation Pattern
In order to understand the deformation pattern along the height of
the buildings, the LVDT measurements obtained at various posi-
tions along the height, as shown in Fig. 8, were analyzed. The aver-
age of the peak displacements from the LVDTs on both sides at a
given height are used to generate the deformed shape. The de-
formed shapes of the URBM and SC-URBM buildings are shown
in Figs. 21(a and b), respectively. For both buildings, initially, the
flexural deformation mode was dominating. However, for the
SC-URBM building, from 1 to 3 mm displacement amplitudes,
a shear-type displacement profile was seen, which may be attrib-
uted to the lateral load resisting the action of SC elements after the
flexural cracking. The displacement at the base is comparatively
higher for the SC-URBM building when compared to the URBM
building. Shear sliding of the roof slab for displacement greater
than 1.27 mm can also be observed for the URBM building.
Theoretical Prediction
The maximum horizontal shear that can be resisted by a rocking
brick masonry wall failing under static in-plane loading may
be approximated by introducing a proper stress distribution for
the masonry in compression and neglecting the tensile strength
ð3Þ of the bed joints (Magenes and Calvi 1997). The relation proposed
04022195-13 J. Struct. Eng.
J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195
 Equivalent viscous damping ratio (%)
50 50

Equivalent Viscous Damping Ratio (%)

URBM URBM
SC-URBM SC-URBM
40 40

30 30

20 20

10 10
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0 0
0 10 20 30 40 50 0 10 20 30 40 50
(a) Peak Roof Displacement (mm) (b) Peak Roof Displacement (mm)

Fig. 20. Equivalent damping versus peak displacement in (a) positive; and (b) negative loading cycles.

4000 4000
Height of Specimen (mm)

Height of Specimen (mm)

3000 3000

2000 0.09 2000 0.09

0.43
0.76 0.26
1.27 1.04
2.47 1.51
3.2 2.46
3.45
1000 1000

0 0
0 1 2 3 4 0 1 2 3 4
(a) Displacement w.r.t base (mm) (b) Displacement w.r.t base (mm)

Fig. 21. Deformed shape of (a) URBM building; and (b) SC-URBM building for various peak displacements.

by Magenes and Calvi (1997) is considered here for the in-plane
strength calculation and is given as follows:
V r ¼ ðD × t=αv Þ × ðp=2Þ × ð1 − p=ðK × fu ÞÞ
where D, t, and H0 = length, thickness, and effective height of the
wall, respectively; and αv ¼ H0 =D. Further, p and f u are mean
vertical stress on the wall (here calculated as 0.1 MPa) and com-
pressive strength of the masonry, respectively. K is a parameter
(with a value of 0.85) to take into account the vertical stress dis-
tribution at the compressed toe. The in-plane strength of the rocking
wall is obtained as 76.3 kN. The experimental value for the SC-
URBM wall was found to be 83.6 kN, (i.e., a deviation of about
9.6% from the calculated value). The analytical evaluation consid-
ered is particularly for masonry walls with a flexural rocking mode
of failure. Here, the effect of semiconfining elements is however
neglected since it requires further investigations, and its contribu-
tion to the in-plane strength is nominal. Further, the in-plane
strength of a single rocking wall of the SC-URBM building is con-
sidered half of the average peak load obtained for the positive and
negative loading cycles.
Conclusions
An experimental study was conducted on two identical full-scale
single-story brick masonry buildings: one was completely unrein-
forced (URBM), and the other was retrofitted with semiconfining
horizontal and vertical RC elements (SC-URBM). Both buildings
were subjected to reverse slow-cyclic quasi-static loading protocol
(FEMA 461) to study the improvements in the seismic performance
ð4Þ of the SC-URBM building when compared to the URBM building.
However, the study focused on the evaluation of only the in-plane
behavior as the out-of-plane inertial effect could not be simulated in
the experiment. Also, if full anchorage of the band with roof and
floor slabs could have been achieved, the failure mode could have
been different.
From the experimental results of both buildings, the following
conclusions can be made:
• The observed hysteretic behavior represented a significant en-
hancement in ductility and energy dissipation capacity of the
SC-URBM building with an approximate increase in strength
of 14% and 30% for both positive and negative loading cycles
when compared with the URBM building.
• The behavior of SC-URBM observed at the ultimate displace-
ment was stable due to the rocking mode and out-of-plane
collapse was not seen, unlike URBM building.
• Although vertical bands were not fully anchored to the roof
and base slabs for the adopted scheme of the SC-URBM
building, it was actually observed to behave as a single unit
even at significantly higher displacement levels compared to
the URBM building. Hence, it actually enhanced the capability
of the SC-URBM building to have significantly higher ductility
and energy dissipation capacity as compared to the URBM
building.

© ASCE 04022195-14 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195

 • The parameters used for representing the building behavior
under earthquakes are sensitive to bilinear idealization assump-
tions. The IBC (2008) idealization is found to give lower elastic
stiffness and ductility as compared to the ASTM (2011)
idealization.
• The initial stiffness for the SC-URBM building is observed to be
higher [26.5% and 12% increase considering ASTM (2011) and
IBC (2008) idealizations] than the URBM building due to the
addition of semiconfining elements. Linear degradation with a
much lower slope was obtained for the higher displacements due
to the enhanced deformation capacity of the SC-URBM
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building.
• The roof rotation observed was lower in the SC-URBM
building, which showed that the confining elements provided
increased torsional rigidity to the building along with symmet-
ric behavior.
• Enhanced energy dissipation capacity of SC-URBM was ob-
served, which is 2.54 and 2.35 times that of the URBM building
for positive and negative loading cycles, respectively. The
cumulative energy dissipation for SC-URBM is 6.5 times the
energy dissipation by URBM building. A significant increase
in the energy dissipation capacity of the SC-URBM building
through a rocking motion for higher displacement amplitudes
was observed when compared with the URBM building.
• Hysteretic damping was observed almost the same for both
buildings, but the semiconfined building could maintain the
same damping (10%) for higher displacements (up to 19 mm)
after initial elastic behavior, beyond which a slight decrease was
observed. The damping observed at ultimate displacement was
8%. So the SC-URBM building seemed to take further loads,
even though the experiment was stopped earlier. But the URBM
building suffered almost total collapse near 12 mm displace-
ment. There was no danger of collapse observed for SC-URBM
building even at 50 mm displacement amplitude, at which the
experiment was stopped.
• Deformed shapes of both buildings illustrated the lateral load-
resisting action of semiconfining elements, whereas shear sliding
of the roof slab was observed for the URBM building.
• In-plane strength for rocking flexural mode of failure of masonry
pier proposed by Magenes and Calvi (1997) gives a conservative
estimate for rocking pier of SC-URBM building.
In summary, for the adopted scheme, the semiconfining ele-
ments were found to be very effective in improving the overall
behavior of masonry walls. The enhanced ductility and energy dis-
sipation capacity along with integrity and stability observed for the
SC-URBM building were notable, especially at the higher drift
levels. Thus, from this study, it is evident that the proposed scheme
of retrofitting the existing deficient URBM buildings is minimally
intrusive, easily implementable, and economic while rendering a
significantly better seismic performance as compared to these origi-
nal buildings.
Data Availability Statement
All data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are
available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully acknowledge and appreciate the logistic
support provided by the Structural Engineering Laboratory, IIT
Kanpur, for smooth conduction of the experiment.
© ASCE 04022195-15
J. Struct. Eng., 2022, 148(12): 04022195
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