Seismic strengthening of reinforced concrete frames by precast concrete panels

Abstract

An innovative occupant-friendly retrofitting technique has been developed for reinforced concrete (RC)-framed structures which constitute the major portion of the existing building stock. The idea is to convert the existing hollow brick infill wall into a load-carrying system acting as a cast-in-place concrete shear wall by reinforcing it with relatively thin high-strength precast concrete panels epoxy bonded to the plastered infill wall and epoxy connected to the frame members. In this study, results of 11 one-third scale, one-bay, one-storey RC frames, tested by the authors, having the deficiencies commonly observed in residential buildings in Turkey, tested under reverse-cyclic lateral loading until failure are given in detail. It was clearly observed that the seismic performance indicators such as strength, lateral stiffness and energy dissipation capacity of the strengthened frames were significantly improved by the proposed technique.