Out-of-plane instability of thin single-layered members: advancements in the characterization of the mechanism
(2018) 16th European Conference on Earthquake Engineering — Location: Thessaloniki, Greece
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- (en) Out-of-plane instability of thin reinforced concrete walls under in-plane seismic actions is a failure mechanism that was observed after the earthquakes in Chile (2010) and New Zealand (2011). Past experimental campaigns carried out to study this phenomenon focussed almost exclusively on members where the longitudinal reinforcement is placed in two layers. However, recent experimental programs carried out at EPFL on single-layered reinforced concrete members allowed understanding important differences in the buckling mechanism of members with one and two layers of reinforcement. Advanced finite element models have been applied to study this particular type of instability, and the numerical results agree well with the experimental ones both in terms of global and local response parameters. Past experimental effort identified the maximum tensile strain experienced by the boundary element of the wall as the governing parameter triggering the out-of-plane instability. The existing phenomenological models are based on approximating the wall boundary element as an isolated prism subjected to tensile-compressive loading. Findings obtained from tests and numerical simulation showed that this approximation, although useful for understanding the mechanism, leads to rather poor predictions of the critical tensile strain triggering out-of-plane failure in walls. This paper presents the recent advancements in the characterization of the out-of-plane instability of single-layered reinforced concrete members, highlighting the main results of two experimental programs and of the finite element simulations. On the basis of the latter, an improved boundary element model is presented and its capacity to provide more accurate predictions of the wall behaviour is demonstrated.
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