The need to act quickly, because of the risks connected to the inspection of a damaged structure

and because reports need to be made as quickly as possible, often means the adoption of forms
that are not rich in details, the use of which is limited to the emergency phase. However, it is
important that the first assessment of damage represents a structural interpretation of the damage,
in order to understand the vulnerability of the building and to serve as a starting point for the
rehabilitation. So as it is important to define the need for emergency provisional structures in the
meantime.
In fact, it is worth noting that the survey of damage in emergency represents the state of the fabric
immediately after the traumatic event, but this useful information risks being cancelled by further
collapses, partial demolition (always to be avoided where possible), and provisional interventions.
The empirical observation of the damages caused to buildings by earthquakes of medium or high
intensity highlighted that buildings subject to the same seismic excitation show radically different
behaviour, related to their typology, construction rules, materials used and maintenance level. In
case of complex buildings, that are the result of subsequent changes (Figure 2.3), the analyses of
the historic centres need a proper structural modelling: this is necessary in order to appraise the
specific vulnerability of complex buildings, due to their typical historical evolution (constructive
sequence, damages, previous interventions, etc.).
The research previously developed simplified procedures and models for the limit analysis of
existing masonry structures in seismic area (Borri 2004a,c), (Modena 2004b), (Tassios 2009).
Such procedures allow the evaluation of the safety level of existing buildings in old centres
according to the real conditions detectable in situ, often not satisfying the main hypothesis at the
base of calculation methods designed and aimed at modern masonry structures (insufficient
connections among components, presence of poor and non-homogeneous materials, lack of bond
in the thickness of masonry wall, etc.).

Figure 2.3 Building evolution of the 4th level of the Suore della Visitazione Convent at Taggia. From (Binda 2003d)

2.1 GENERAL CONSIDERATION

Masonry building represents a box-type structural system composed of vertical structural elements
- walls - and horizontal structural elements – floors and roofs. Vertical loads are transferred from
the floors, acting as horizontal flexural members, to the bearing walls, and from the bearing walls,
acting as vertical compression members, to the foundation system.
As known, when a building is subjected to an earthquake motion, the inertia force, proportional to
the masses of the structural system has to be taken into account. Those action effects depend on
various parameters, such as the mass and the stiffness of the structure and their distribution, the
magnitude of the imposed actions, the number of cycles of the earthquake motion, the
characteristics of the foundation soil, etc.
Since the ground motion is in general three-directional both vertical and horizontal inertia forces
will be acting on the structure, inducing displacements, changing in-time (both in magnitude and in
sign), and resulting in the three-dimensional vibrations of the building.).
Horizontal inertia actions are transferred from the floor structures, which should act as rigid
horizontal diaphragms, into the bearing walls, causing shearing and bending effects, and from the
bearing walls into the foundation system. Additionally, due to the distributed mass of wall elements,
distributed inertia forces are induced resulting in out of plane bending of walls.

5
Experimental testing and observation of damage modality of real structures have shown that
masonry walls are less resistant to actions perpendicular to their medium plane (out-of-plane
actions) than to actions parallel to this plane (in-plane actions). In the first case, the stiffness of the
wall is far less than in the other. For a good load bearing behaviour, all walls of a masonry building
should resist actions parallel to them, avoiding inflection and overturning. This philosophy
considers the behaviour of the building as a box. The walls should be connected, by stiff
constraints to the floor, because the floor should be able to distribute the seismic actions between
the walls as a function of their stiffness.
It is generally recognized that a satisfactory seismic behaviour is attained only if out-of plane
collapse is prevented and in-plane strength and deformation capacity of walls can be fully
exploited.
The seismic vulnerability of masonry buildings depends on several parameters, such as in-plan
and/or in-height irregularity, discontinuity of walls/piers along the height of the building, alteration of
the initial structural scheme during the lifetime of the building, inadequate interventions after
previous seismic events, low quality construction type of masonry and/or low quality of materials,
inadequate connections among vertical elements or between horizontal and vertical elements, lack
of any diaphragm action of horizontal bearing elements, etc.
Box action results in limiting the deformations imposed to masonry during an earthquake and,
hence, prevents extensive damages and collapse. Old masonry structures seldom satisfy the
conditions of ensuring box action: floors and roof are rarely well connected with the walls, floors
and roof do not behave as diaphragms of limited deformability in their plane, the connections
between walls is quite often defective, whereas large openings and openings located close to the
corners of buildings lead to further weakening of the box action.
It has to be mentioned that masonry walls exhibit enhanced vulnerability to out-of-plane bending
(low bending moment capacity mobilized under limited imposed inflexion). This pronounced
vulnerability is negatively affected by all the above mentioned conditions that limit the box action of
buildings, as well as by the poor quality of construction type of masonry and the poor quality of
building materials. Needless to say that previous non-repaired damages, lack of maintenance,
decay of materials, etc. further aggravate the effects of a seismic event.
The observations of masonry buildings when subjected to earthquakes have shown that the
behaviour is strongly dependent on how the walls are interconnected and anchored and to floors
and roofs. In old structure the unfavourable effect of insufficient anchorage between walls and
between walls and floors was often observed. Irregular structural layout in plan, large openings and
lack of bearing walls in both directions often caused severe damage or even collapse. A good
quality of the connections between floors and walls, between roof and walls and between
perpendicular walls is also crucial to reach a good global seismic behaviour of the building. Good
quality connections will drive the collapse of the construction to a configuration that requires a
stronger seismic action (Borri 2009).
Other contributing factors include (1) original configuration and craftsmanship of the masonry; (2)
modifications made over time, such as buttresses and ties (which improve the general
performance) and additional storeys (which tend to compromise the performance); (3) the
characteristics, quality, and condition of the masonry; (4) the appropriate thickness of the bearing
and non-bearing walls and discontinuities; (5) the method and configuration of the connection of
the floors and roof to the walls; and (6) the materials and design of the floors and roofs themselves.
The most important factors tend to differ with the building typology.

6
2.2 THE SEISMIC BEHAVIOUR OF EXISTING MASONRY BUILDINGS:
MORPHOLOGY OF DAMAGES AND FAILURE MECHANISMS
Damage to masonry buildings can be essentially interpreted on the basis of two fundamental
collapse mechanisms. According Giuffrè definition (Giuffrè 1993a), the “First Damage Mode” is
produced by seismic actions perpendicular to the wall (out-of-plane) that cause the overturning of
the whole wall panel or of a significant portion of it (Figure 2.4a). A signature of such damage,
short of collapse, can be the shedding of a portion of the exterior leaf of masonry. Another can be
the formation of vertical cracks at the corners of a building where the wall began to form a hinge
from the swaying.
This behaviour represents the highest building vulnerability and in the past was prevented by the
use of ties to compensate for the lack of connection between the external walls and the ones
orthogonal to them. The effectiveness of the tie consists in involving the walls orthogonal to the
facade as containing elements. They resist to the seismic action transmitted by the facades as in
plane action and exert a higher resistance towards such action. When the action overcomes the
strength, also the walls stressed in their plane can crack, according to the classic diagonal course
which isolates a triangular part of the wind-brace wall and makes it participate to the cracking
motion. This further damage modality - called “Second Mode of Damage” - can be checked only
when the “first mode” doesn’t occur thanks to metallic connections (Figure 2.4b).

Figure 2.4 First mode (a) and second mode (b) collapse mechanisms (Giuffrè 1993), (Carocci 2001)

While the “first mode” is always ruinous, as it implies the complete collapse of the wall and
consequent ruin of all supported elements, the “second mode” does not necessarily determine the
collapse, though it still implies small, medium and even large cracks of the wind-brace walls.
The Second Damage Mode is caused, as said before, by forces acting in the plane of the wall and
is usually marked by inclined cracks associated with shear forces that often result in an “X” pattern,
but it seldom reaches the total collapse. However, when a full shear crack occurs during an
earthquake, the triangular sections of the panel can become unstable, leading to collapse.
In historic centres, as well as in building evolved in time the addition of adjacent constructions or
portions implies the lack of strong connections between the parts. The “consequence of this
organic defect is the particular fragility of the historical house towards the seismic action” (Giuffrè
1993), (Giuffrè 1996).
Lack of structural integrity is one of the principal sources of weakness responsible for severe
damage leading to collapse.
The problems could have origin from all the structural changes, due also to some interventions to
adequate building to modern uses and standards. Windows and doors, including garage doors,
perforate the exterior walls, leaving an inadequate number of shear walls or connections to support
the buildings during an earthquake. Frequently upper story additions had been constructed with
heavy concrete floors and roofs, or with new concrete and hollow clay tile floors retrofitting into the
older masonry structures. The added stiffness and weight of these upper story alterations and
additions further increased the risk of failures in the original low-strength masonry walls.

7
The presence of in-plane flexible diaphragms, typically timber floors and roofs as well as thin
masonry vaults, is very common in the existing masonry buildings. Even though proper
connections between walls and floors allow to prevent local first mode mechanisms, in masonry
buildings with flexible floors the global seismic response is quite complex. Since no or little
coupling effect can be operated by the horizontal structures, vertical structures (walls) tend to
behave independently. However, an acceptable approach in practice could be to analyze
separately the in-plane seismic response of each masonry wall as extracted from the global
structure with its pertaining loads and inertial masses.

2.2.1 In plane behaviour

Figure 2.5 (Tomasevic 2000) illustrates that in the plane of the walls, bending and shear cause
horizontal and diagonal cracks, respectively. In-plane mechanisms induce the typical shear
damage, which often is not sufficient to lead to structure collapse. The limited damage in Figure 2.5
is due to the effective strong connection among the structural components and the presence of
floors able to transmit the horizontal forces to shear walls, both characterizing the favourable “box”
behaviour of buildings under seismic actions.
Unfortunately the layout of historic buildings, their discontinuities, the changing in time, lack of
maintenance etc., led frequently to different behaviours (Figure 2.6).

Figure 2.5 Deformation of the building and typical damage to structural walls. From (Tomazevic 2000)

Figure 2.6 Behaviour of masonry buildings: a) structural walls not tied together, b) building with deformable floors and
tied walls, c) building with rigid floors and tied walls. From (Tomazevic 2000).

Observation of seismic damage to masonry walls, as well as laboratory experimental tests, showed
that masonry piers subjected to in-plane loading may have two typical types of behaviour, with
local cracks according to Figure 2.5, with which different failure modes are associated:
• Flexural behaviour: this may involve two different modes of failure. If the applied vertical load is
low with respect to compressive strength, the horizontal load produces tensile flexural cracking at
the corners (Figure 2.7a), and the pier begins to behave as a nearly rigid body rotating around the
toe (rocking). If no significant flexural cracking occurs, due to a sufficiently high vertical load, the
pier is progressively characterized by a widespread damage pattern, with sub-vertical cracks
oriented towards the more compressed corners (crushing). In both cases, the ultimate limit state is
obtained by failure at the compressed corners (Figure 2.7a).

8
 Figure 2.7 Typical failure modes of masonry piers due to horizontal loads: (a) rocking; (b) sliding shear failure; and (c)
diagonal cracking. From (Calderini 2009).

• Shear behaviour This may produce two different modes of failure: (a) in sliding shear failure, the
development of flexural cracking at the tense corners reduces the resisting section; failure is
attained with sliding on a horizontal bed joint plane, usually located at one of the ends of the pier
(Figure 2.7b); (b) in diagonal cracking, when failure is attained with the formation of a diagonal
crack, which usually develops at the centre of the pier and then propagates towards the corners
(Figure 2.7c). The crack may pass prevailingly through mortar joints (assuming the shape of a
‘stair-stepped’ path in the case of a regular masonry pattern, or also through the blocks (Figure
2.8).

Figure 2.8 Influence of the mortar-brick adhesion in the joints

The occurrence of different failure modes depends on several parameters: (a) the geometry of the
pier; (b) the boundary conditions (Calderini 2009); (c) the acting axial load; (d) the mechanical
characteristics of the masonry constituents (mortar, blocks and interfaces); (e) the masonry
geometrical characteristics (block aspect ratio, in-plane and cross-section masonry pattern). In the
past, many experimental tests have been carried out in order to analyse the influence of these
parameters on the failure mode of masonry piers. In general, it has been assessed that rocking
tends to prevail in slender piers, while bed joint sliding tends to occur only in very squat piers
(Magenes 1992), (Magenes 1997). In moderately slender piers, diagonal cracking tends to prevail
over rocking and bed joint sliding for increasing levels of vertical compression (Mayes 1975a),
(Bosiljkov 2003), (Vasconcelos 2006).
Diagonal cracking propagating through blocks tends to prevail over diagonal cracking propagating
through mortar joints for increasing levels of vertical compression (Lourenço 2005) and for
increasing ratios between mortar and block strengths (Mayes 1975b) (Bosiljkov 2003). Increasing
interlocking of blocks (block aspect ratio plus masonry pattern) may induce a transition from
diagonal cracking through mortar joints to rocking (Vasconcelos 2006), (Giuffrè 1993) to diagonal

9
cracking through blocks or to bed joint sliding. Crushing, in general, occurs for high levels of
vertical compression (related to the compressive strength of the material).
It is worth pointing out that it is not always easy to distinguish the occurrence of a specific type of
mechanism, since many interactions may occur between them.

2.2.2 Out of plane behaviour

Besides the in-plane failure, the external masonry walls of a house can typically be subjected to
out-of-plane mechanisms (Figure 2.9).

Figure 2.9 Collapse mechanisms of masonry walls under out-of-plane horizontal action. From (Rondelet 1834)

Direct observation of crack patterns recorded in post-earthquake damage surveys (D’Ayala

1999b), (D’Ayala 2003a), together with the available literature on the survey of stone masonry
buildings damage due to earthquake (Karantoni 1997), (Tomazevic 1999), yields to the conclusion
that often the most recurrent failure mechanism surveyed is the overturning of the street façade.
This, however, occurs most commonly involving portions of the party walls as well.
The way in which this will develop depends on the quality and strength of the connections with the
other elements of the structure, party walls, internal load-bearing partitions, floors, and roof
structures. If the structure was not strengthened, it is assumed that the only means of restraint to
overturning exerted by other elements to a wall is governed by the friction of the contact surface,
and this will give rise to different types of failures, highlighted in the examples of Figure 2.10 and
Figure 2.11 (D’Ayala 2003a).

Figure 2.10 Overturning mechanisms related to the restraints effectiveness. From (Borri 2004c)

Figure 2.11 Mechanisms for overturning failures. From (D’Ayala 2003a).

10
However, if the building structural capacity has been improved, by means of the introduction of ties
or ring beams, then usually the simple overturning is prevented, while mechanisms relying on arch
effect develop (Figure 2.12).
The structural behaviour of a very complex building can be analysed in meaningful structural
portion. The analysis can be peculiarly complicated in agglomerates of buildings (Figure 2.13). The
first step, then, is to recognise structural portions (structural units - SU) and, then, the damage
mechanisms. The developed methodology is referred to the structural portions called
macroelement, and to the damage and collapse mechanism.

Figure 2.12 Mechanism for failures based on arch effect. From (D’Ayala 2003a).

Figure 2.13 Mechanism for overturning failures. From (Giuffrè 1993).

More in detail, a macroelement is the building portions structurally recognisable with an

autonomous behaviour respect to the whole building. Macro-elements are defined by single or
combined structural components (walls, floors and roof), considering their mutual bond (potential
damage pattern, cracks, borders of poor connections, etc.) and restraints (e.g. the presence of ties
or ring beams), the constructive deficiencies and the characteristics of the constitutive materials.
They behave independently as a whole without any support by other portions of the building, but
they follow kinematic mechanisms, both out- and in-plane. Thus they are elements in hazardous
conditions for possible incipient brittle collapse.
The damage mechanism in general tends to separate the masonry portion, distinguishing the
macroelement. The damage could involve different geometric shapes according to the action and
to the masonry properties. The direct survey of the crack pattern can clearly identify the real
behaviour of the structural system.
In the case of churches, as an example, the seismic response showed recurrent behaviour,
according to local damage and collapse mechanisms of the different architectonic parts, called
macro-elements (i.e., facade, nave, triumphal arch, etc.), which behave almost independently

11
(Doglioni 1994), (Lagomarsino 2004a) (Figure 2.14-Figure 2.15). If masonry shows good
characteristics, local damage mechanisms (e.g., out-of plane overturning, rocking) develop as loss
of equilibrium of masonry portions capable of sliding and rotating.
Focusing on the development of this kind of failures, the initial damage phase may generally be
very far from the ultimate condition, because of the structural resources in the post-cracked state
(the so-called “dynamic stability”).

Figure 2.14 Macroelements of a church (Doglioni 1994)

Figure 2.15 Damage mechanism for churches (Lagomarsino 2004a)

Since the ‘80s in Italy, empirical evaluations, by the so called "vulnerability indexes" (particularly for
masonry buildings (Benedetti 1984), have been proposed, based on weighted sums of vulnerability
factors, related both to structural irregularity aspects recorded by rapid systematic or sample
surveys and to the actual calculations of the resistance to horizontal actions of the masonry walls.
The aim was to compare the vulnerability of different buildings (and thus the priorities for
strengthening operations), and to provide damage scenarios for different seismic intensities.
Within these methodologies and with specific reference to historic masonry buildings, some
procedures have been proposed: they are based on the identification of the values of horizontal
static-equivalent forces (and therefore of the values of the masses accelerations) that can activate
specific mechanisms of local failure / overturning of structural macro-elements (composed by
single walls or subassemblages, as intersecting walls, walls and floors or roof, etc.) in-plane and,

12
especially, out-of-plane (Bernardini 1988), (Bernardini 1990). In these buildings, in fact, the
absence of systematic connections between intersecting walls and between walls and horizontal
structures may cause kinematic mechanisms related to the loss of equilibrium of structural portions
rather than to states of stress exceeding the materials ultimate capacity (Giuffrè 1999); this limit
analysis approach depends on few geometrical and mechanical parameters and therefore it does
not require an extremely accurate survey and time-consuming computation (Bernardini 1999).
Once the critical structural configuration is defined, the subsequent step is the identification of the
most probable collapse mechanisms of each macro-element. The studies based on in-situ surveys
after seismic events allowed to create abaci of the typical damages occurring in constructive
typologies (buildings, churches, palaces (BBCC 1997, 2006)), which led to a consequent
systematization of the mechanical models able to describe their behaviour by kinematic models
(Bernardini 1988) (Bernardini 1990), (Borri 1999b), (D’Ayala 2003a).
Kinematic models provide a coefficient c = a/g (where a is the ground acceleration and g the
gravity acceleration), which represents the seismic masses multiplier characterizing the limit of the
equilibrium conditions for the considered element. In simplified assessment procedures, the
mechanism connected to the lowest value of c is the weakest one and, consequently, the most
probable to occur: in-plane mechanisms are characterized by c coefficients higher than the out-of-
plane ones (Bernardini 1990), (Giuffrè 1999).
The new methodology for the damage assessment considers the most significant collapse
mechanisms in each architectonic part of the building (Figure 2.16-Figure 2.17).
Several works on seismic vulnerability evaluation of masonry structures through limit analysis
procedures have been proposed (Bernardini 1988), (Bernardini 1990), (Bernardini 1999), (Giuffrè
1993), (Giuffrè 1997), (Brun 1999), (de Felice 2000), (D’Ayala 1999a), (D’Ayala 2003a), (Modena
2004a), (Munari 2009), but the research was limited to the calculation of the seismic activation
multiplier, even if evaluated for complex mechanisms. This approach of limit analysis applied to
existing masonry buildings in seismic areas is now provided by the updated Italian seismic code
(PCM 2003), (PCM 2005), which finally takes into account the high vulnerability of existing
masonry buildings not satisfying assumptions commonly more suitable for new earthquake-proof
structures. In this field, another important document is represented by the Guidelines published by
the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage for the evaluation and mitigation of seismic risk of the
architectural heritage (BBCC 1997, 2006), (Moro 2007).

Figure 2.16 Damage mechanisms for row buildings (D’Ayala 1999a)

13
 Figure 2.17 Example of damage mechanisms (Penazzi 2000)

2.3 MASONRY TYPOLOGIES AND MASONRY QUALITY

The construction type, quality and state of preservation of masonry play a fundamental role in
determining the capacity of a construction to sustain seismic actions. Actually, the resistance of
masonry to various actions is not governed by the mechanical properties of the constituent
materials. This problem cannot be studied only in terms of stress and strain: a masonry which can
resist and transfer the vertical and seismic forces without breaking up should have geometric and
physical characteristics that permit a monolithic behaviour (Borri 2009).
Among the meaningful parameters to examine in order to classify a masonry as being of “good
quality” and introduced by the Italian Seismic Code (OPCM 2003), (LLPP 2008, 2009) it is worth to
remember: stones or brick laid in horizontal courses, horizontal courses, vertical mortar joints not-
aligned, mortar vertical joints, use of almost square-shaped and big stones of large size, limited
volume of mortar as compared to the volume of bricks or stones, in case of multileaf masonry,
leaves transversely connected and indeed sufficient mechanical properties of mortar and bricks or
stones.
The structural performance of masonry can be estimated, taking into account the above mentioned
parameters and providing the following factors are known (Binda 2000a): (a) its geometry; (b) the
characteristics of its texture (single or multiple leaf walls, connection between the leaves), (c) the
physical, chemical and mechanical characteristics of the components (brick, stone, mortar); (d) the
characteristics of masonry as a composite material.
One of the most negative cases is that of masonry that is not monolithic along its thickness, as
frequently happens in stone masonry (Figure 2.18). Given the fact that double- or multi-leaf
masonry is in numerous cases used in historic structures, the non-monolithic in-thickness
behaviour of masonry becomes a governing parameter for the behaviour of masonry structures.
Separation between consecutive leaves may be caused by decay of material in-time, combined
with actions (vertical or horizontal) like the eccentric application of normal loads. For instance,
floors or vaults can rest on one leaf of a multi-leaf masonry. Vaults, domes and arches are usually
less thick than the masonry walls and piers by which they are supported. The situation is
aggravated by thrust forces acting along the thickness of masonry elements) may deteriorate
further the state of this type of masonry. Masonry with disconnected leaves is extremely
vulnerable, especially against out-of-plane actions induced by earthquakes.

Given the vast variety of construction types of historic masonries and existing cross sections, and
significant effect of the construction technique on its structural performance, the starting point for a
systematic study on the mechanical behaviour of stonework masonry should begin from systematic

14
survey of the various different geometry and building techniques, including the in-thickness
characteristics (i.e. number of leaves and type of connection -if any- among them).
Such systematic investigation on the morphology of masonry sections on the Italian territory was
started in the early nineties by L. Binda (Abbaneo 1993), (Binda 2000b), as it was considered as a
prerequisite for drafting a necessity to define some guidelines for repair or strengthening by grout
injection ((Baronio 1991), (Binda 1993) and more recently (Valluzzi 2004)).

Figure 2.18 Deformation and failure of a two-leaf wall. From (Giuffrè 1993).

WALL SECTION
Geometrical survey Distribution of stones, mortar and voids in the
detail wall section
100

80

60
[%]

40

20

0
% Stone % Mortar % Voids

Distribution of the voids dimension (cm2)

0 .2 5

0 .2 0

0 .1 5

0 .1 0

0 .0 5

0 .0 0
1 .0 0 1 0 .0 0 1 0 0 .0 0

Figure 2.19 Form representing the wall section and the void calculation (Binda 1993)

Contemporarily Giuffrè carried out in the early '90s (Giuffrè 1990) the first experimental and
analytical studies about the mechanical behaviour of the stonework masonry typologies based on
the recognising of "rule of art" characteristics after visual inspection, survey and typological
classification. The studies were part of a more general analysis on the vulnerability of some
historical centres like Ortigia (Giuffrè 1993), Matera (Giuffrè 1997), Città di Castello (Borri 1995),
(Giovanetti 1998), Palermo (Giuffrè 1999). In each case the local masonry typologies and materials
are carefully studied and reported in an abacus. The presence of some characteristic, like the
connection elements called headers, can be a discriminating parameter for the evaluation of the
wall mechanical behaviour (Figure 2.20).
Other parameters can be: dimension of the elements composing the masonry (bricks, stone,
ashlar, etc.), shape and cutting of the stones, masonry texture, mortar quality, mortar quantity,
presence of wedges, presence of horizontal courses, presence of leaves connections and headers
(Binda 2000b), characteristic of the masonry section, homogeneity of the materials (Figure 2.19.
Each masonry behaviour is then qualitatively evaluated (Figure 2.20b).

15
Giuffrè (Giuffrè 1990), (Giuffrè 1999) proposes in fact, a classification based on a parameter which
indicates the ratio of the distance d between two subsequent headers to the thickness of the
masonry wall. The parameter is representative of the bending resistance of the wall (Figure 2.21-
Figure 2.22).
A classification of single and multiple leaf masonry sections according to the number of leaves and
their connections and the importance of this knowledge for the implementation of numerical models
is commented in (Binda 1994a), (de Felice 2001).
Results obtained from an experimental campaign carried out on the transfer of shear stresses
between leaves of multiple leaf walls subject to vertical and horizontal actions presented in (Binda
2003a).

a) b)

Figure 2.20 Header influence and stability of the wall a) (Giuffrè 1993), b) (Giuffrè 1990)

Figure 2.21 Influence on the wall stability of the number and position of the headers (Giuffrè 1999).

16
 Figure 2.22 Stone masonry survey indicating very good, good and poor connection (Giuffrè 1993)

2.4 BUILDING TYPOLOGIES

Analytical models are necessary in order to evaluate the seismic behaviour of a building, calculate
the load carrying capacity and safety of the structures and to suggest appropriate repair
techniques. Nevertheless, due to the complexity of the building geometry and masonry
characteristics their use must take into account the many different types of masonry structures
which are representative of the building function: houses (isolated, in rows, complex aggregates),
palaces, churches, towers, castles, fortifications, etc (Figure 2.15, Figure 2.23). It has been also
clarified that the knowledge of the typical features of each historical building, regarding, for
example, the constitutive materials (i.e. masonry typology and arrangement), the structural type
(common building, isolated/in aggregate, churches, towers, palaces), is essential for the definition
of suitable interpretative models. In addition, the preliminary diagnosis of the building, regarding
history, geometry, materials, connections, etc., should constitute the basis for all safety evaluation
and intervention planning (Giuffrè 1990), (Giuffrè 1993), (Doglioni 1994), (Binda 1999a).
The building and structure typology is so much important that a reliable approach to their
restoration and preservation should refer to a methodology of investigation and choice for the most
appropriate techniques applied to the special type of building and materials (Modena 1997a),
(Binda 2003b). It has been shown by the earthquake, that even if the buildings belong to the same
age and type of construction the isolated house or dwelling have different failure mechanisms than
buildings in a row (Giuffrè 1993), (Binda 1999a,b), (Carocci 2001), (Binda 2004a) (Figure 2.16-
Figure 2.17).
The analysis of buildings belonging to an aggregation is different than the case of an isolated
building (Binda 2004a), because of the several interactions that the adjacent volumes could act on
the structural unit which is analysed.
The main structural interaction may be classified in two categories (Borri 2009) (Figure 2.24):
a) vertical loads or horizontal actions (especially under the seismic action) from adjacent buildings;
b) buttressing or constraining effects offered by the adjacent buildings.
These interactions modify the collapse mechanism of the aggregation and of its structural unit
introducing new different actions and changing the constraint configuration.
Lack of alignment between façades causes the lack of contrast from adjacent buildings, as in case
of head buildings in rows. Another vulnerability source could be the different height of the buildings,
with stiff changes that might lead to possible collapse of the higher one. Floors at different levels in
adjacent building could act against the common wall.

17
 Type A) Type B) Row Houses Type C) Palaces
Isolated houses
and/or dwellings

Consoli Palace in
Ms7 axonometric Sel UMI 23 – axonometric view Gubbio
Type D) Type E) Arenas
Bell-Towers

The
Torrazzo
of
Cremona

plan section
The Colosseum in Rome
Type F) Churches and Cathedrals

F1) Churches: F2) Churches: central plan

plan based on latin cross scheme

S. Maria del
Fiore: plan Gothic Cathedral San Vitale: plan and axonometry

Figure 2.23 Building typologies (Binda 2003b)

Figure 2.24 Hammering from adjacent building (Borri 2004c)

High rise towers and bell-towers suffer from similar long term damage due to vertical loads (to
which horizontal actions are added during earthquakes) which can bring them to failure even after
centuries. So it is not possible to use the same investigation procedures, modelling and repair
measures for Palaces, Churches, etc. (Doglioni 1994), (PCM 2001), (Sepe 2008).

18
An approach to restoration and retrofitting should be proposed by classes of buildings and
structures (Binda 2003b). It is frequently impossible to apply techniques of intervention equal for all
the building classes.
The survey of the historic centres produces interesting cataloguing of the building typologies but
also of the typical transformation recognised (Figure 2.25-Figure 2.26). In fact, each typology but
also each transformation can lead to specific damages due to the loss of continuity or to bad
connections (Figure 2.27).
The mechanical behaviour of each typology is then summarised by an expected damage abacus
(Giuffrè 1996). This approach was very clear in the research concerning the seismic vulnerability of
the historic centres of Ortigia (Giuffrè 1993), Matera (Giuffrè 1997), Città di Castello (Giovannetti
1998), and Palermo (Giuffrè 1999).

Figure 2.25 The row buildings typology of Campi Alto. Buildings have three storey: the first one with an entrance at the
lower street (for stables or deposits), one in the middle and the last with the entrance at the upper street (for living
places). The lowest storey is partially excavated in the natural rock. The ground floor rooms are covered by barrel vaults
that, despite the several seismic events, are still well preserved, even in the partially collapsed buildings. From (Binda
2004a).

Figure 2.26 Damages resulting from historical evolution and transformation; constructive stages in a row (Carocci 2001)

Figure 2.27 Evolution and damage mechanisms of the row buildings in Citerna (Borri 2004c)

19
A similar project carried out by Bernardini and others (Bernardini 1988, 1990, 2000) and partially
financed by GNDT (Bernardini 2000) developed a software for the evaluation of the vulnerability of
buildings, recently updated (Modena 2008), (Munari 2009) on the base of the damages extensively
surveyed after the Umbria-Marche earthquake (Figure 2.28-Figure 2.29), (Cardani 2004). The
seismic behaviour principles are common, starting from the recognition of wall portions and
considering their overturning (Figure 2.30). Even in this case the repair effect is easily computed.
Analysing the limit state of the structures, the requested information deals mainly to geometric
characteristics of the buildings, presence of ties and to qualitative evaluation about the monolithicy
and the texture of the masonry. The specific weight and the resistance of the material if unknown
were suggested in the help menu taking into account the Italian seismic code.

2.3 - SCHEMA DEI CINEMATISMI E STATO DI DANNO (anno 2001) DELL'EDIFICIO U.M.I. 10
2.1.3 - INTERVENTI DI CONSOLIDAMENTO (anno 1990) DELL'EDIFICIO U.M.I. 20

INIEZIONI CON MALTA 1 1

2
RIFACIMENTO DELLA MURATURA IN 2
LATERIZIO
3
2

0 1 3 5m
PROSPETTO SUD
PIANTA PIANO TERRA

INIEZIONI CON MALTA

RIFACIMENTO DELLA MURATURA IN

LATERIZIO
1 5

RIFACIMENTO ARCHITRAVE IN C.A.

0 1 3 5m

PROSPETTO NORD
PIANTA PIANO PRIMO

1 Danno: lesioni diffuse in corrispondeza delle teste delle 1 Meccanismo: martellamento degli elementi di copertura
travi di copertura. per spinta fuori piano.

2 Danno: lieve spanciamento della parete con lesioni 2 Meccanismo: spinta fuori dal piano della parete sud a
INIEZIONI CON MALTA
pressocchè verticali in corrispondenza degli elementi di causa della particolare conformazione della pianta, della
differente rigidezza. disomogeneità del tessuto murario, e della spinta delle
travi del solaio.
RIFACIMENTO DELLA MURATURA IN
LATERIZIO
3 Danno: lesione verticale in corrispondenza dell'attacco 3 Meccanismo: risposte differenziate all'azione sismica
dei due edifici. degli edifici adiacenti; nel punto di collegamento, che è la
RIFACIMENTO DELLA MURATURA IN zona più debole, si presenta una concentrazione di sforzi
PIETRA di trazione che porta alla rottura del collegamento stesso.

RIFACIMENTO ARCHITRAVE IN C.A. 4 Danno: lesione nel maschio snello 4 Meccanismo: schiacciamento dell'elemento snello per
forze nel piano della parete.

5 Danno: lesione in prossimità dell'angolata 5 Meccanismo: distacco tra i muri d'ambito per interazione
NOTA: il progetto è stato realizzato dall'architetto F.M.
di forze agenti sulle pareti ortogonali.
Poggiolini in collaborazione con il geometra Salvatori M.
0 1 3 5m
nell'anno 1983.

a) b) c) d)
PIANTA PIANO SECONDO

Figure 2.28 Some examples from the survey form with reference to: a) general survey (plans, sections and photos); b)
masonry structure and typology; c) past intervention projects and d) damage survey and evaluation of the possible
collapse mechanisms (Binda 2000b).

The updated version of the software (Modena 2008), (Munari 2009) developed at the University of
Padova is based on models calculating the accelerations which activate local collapse
mechanisms of macro-elements that can develop in historical masonry buildings. The procedure
takes into account two automatic procedures a) the c-Sisma procedure allows to carry out ultimate
limit state assessments of the most probable severe local kinematic mechanism, as required by the
Codes; b) the Vulnus methodology, based on the fuzzy set theory, provides global vulnerability
assessments of individual structural units or groups of buildings, as well as fragility curves related
to the achievement or overcoming of the limit state of heavy damage.
The automatic procedure was calibrated thanks to the extensive investigation carried out on 4
small typical historic centre in Umbria hit by 1997 earthquake and repaired after a previous event in
1979 (Binda 1999a, 1999b, 2003d, 2005b, 2008a), (Cardani 2004). The investigation, supported
by GNDT – Italian Group for the Protection against Earthquake - (which involved three Research
Units (RU): Politecnico of Milan, University of Padua and the Italian Ministry of Cultural Properties)
collected information by a form specifically developed (Figure 2.28), (Binda 2000b), (Cardani
2004), and had the strategic aim to: (a) collect information on the effectiveness of the repair
techniques, (b) define a methodology for the vulnerability analysis of a building patrimony
previously considered as minor, but meaningful testimonies of the cultural heritage, (c) calibrate
and define a "minimal" investigation program, eventually carried out by the municipality or by the
province or region, (d) to set up Databases storing the information useful to prepare rescue plans,
(e) to use the collected knowledge for the implementation of reliable models for the vulnerability
analysis (Figure 2.29-Figure 2.30). This was carried out in order to support the designers in
choosing the right analytical model for the safety definition and the appropriate intervention
techniques for their projects.
The research was based on (Figure 2.28): a) the survey of the building typology, b) their geometry
and crack pattern, c) the materials characterisation on site (by non destructive and minor
destructive techniques) and in laboratory. The outputs of the research were: a database collecting

20
all the information of each building containing also an abacus of the most typical and frequent
collapse mechanisms, guidelines for architects and engineers concerning the diagnostic
investigation.

Figure 2.29 Damage surveyed after the Umbria earthquake (Penazzi 2000), (Cardani 2004)

21
 a) b)

Figure 2.30 Kinematic models for out-of-plane mechanisms: a) vertical strips b) horizontal strips (Bernardini 1988),
(Modena 2008), (Munari 2009)

In previous time, Doglioni, Moretti and Petrini (Doglioni 1994) carried out vulnerability analysis,
starting from similar basis, for the Friuli churches and bell-towers (Figure 2.14, Figure 2.31),
damaged by 1976 earthquake. The cataloguing of the typologies, structural details and damages
was an important tool for successive researches and interventions on seismic area.
Similar analysis were carried out later on by Lagomarsino (Lagomarsino 1997), (Lagomarsino
1998a), (Lagomarsino 1998b), on the Umbria and Marche churches, damaged by the 1997
earthquakes (Figure 2.15), on some Catania churches (Cocina 1999), on the churches of
Lunigiana and Garfagnana (Angeletti 1997) and Molise (Lagomarsino 2004c). These studies
allowed to verify the appropriateness of simplified structural models (Brencich 1998), (Lagomarsino
2004b) analysing the main church elements and their collapse mechanisms for the seismic actions
(Figure 2.14, Figure 2.15, Figure 2.31). The previous research allowed the development of damage
survey templates with drawings illustrating the most important crack pattern after earthquakes
(Figure 2.2) (PCM 2001)

a) b)

Figure 2.31 Example of Bell-Towers typologies in Friuli (a) and (b) crack pattern of a bell-tower and interpretation of the
damage mechanisms (Doglioni 1994).

22
An interesting approach for the vulnerability evaluation of churches with no conventional plan
(irregular asymmetrical plan, circular elliptic, octagonal plan, etc.) is proposed by Borri (Borri
2004b), considering the geometric aspect, static aspect and masonry quality. It allows determining
the vulnerability index of churches with irregular plan, not considered in other methodologies and
its effectiveness by a parameter concerning the information quality, which takes into account the
origin of the data, if some test were carried out or not, etc.
Starting from the previous experimental research and from the mechanism of collapse survey,
several other studies were carried out, recognising even more complex mechanism and
interpretative algorithms for building typologies, structural assemblages, etc. (e.g. Italian
Conference of Seismic Engineering, 1999 - 2009). The Civil Protection Department and the
Ministry of Cultural Properties in Italy have published damage survey templates with detailed
drawings illustrating the most important crack pattern after the earthquake in churches and palaces
(PCM 2001) (Figure 2.2).

23
3 COMPONENT TYPOLOGIES AND DAMAGE MECHANISMS

3.1 MASONRY WALLS AND PILLARS

3.1.1 Masonry typologies

In safety evaluation for overturning mechanisms, results may not be completely adequate if the
calculation procedure only takes into account geometric parameters and disregards mechanical
characteristics (e.g., masonry quality). In fact, some authors (Giuffrè 1993 1999), (de Felice 2001),
(Baggio-Carocci in Bernardini 2000) showed both theoretically and by experimental testing that the
lack of transversal monolithic behaviour induces the mechanism activation in case of low values of
the seismic multiplier (Figure 2.18, Figure 2.20, Figure 2.21, Figure 2.28, Figure 3.1, Figure 3.2).
A safety check evaluation for overturning mechanisms around the block edge implies the idea that
the compressive stress is unlimited. In order to take mechanical characteristics into account, in
particular limited compressive strength, a possible procedure implies translating the strength issue
into an equivalent geometric issue: the hinge position can be shifted inward (reducing the virtual
work of the resisting actions) proportionally to the decrease in masonry quality (Figure 3.3).
The damage observation has, in fact, highlighted how the masonry quality was fundamental to the
understanding of the seismic behaviour of historic buildings, particularly in stone-work masonry.
Brittle failures are frequent in stone-masonry walls characterized by two or three leaves without an
effective transversal connection. Therefore, this parameter is important to evaluate the seismic
vulnerability of historical monuments. The presence of headers (Figure 3.4), stone elements
positioned thorough the wall section, realizes a connection between the different leaves and
represents one of those rules of thumb traditionally associated with the good quality of masonry.

Figure 3.1 Overturning mechanisms of several masonry typologies. Baggio-Carocci in (Bernardini 2000)

24
 Figure 3.2 Overturning mechanisms of monolithic wall and two-leaves wall. (Borri 1999b)

Figure 3.3 Overturning mechanism of a monolithic wall: the hinge position can be shifted inward (reducing the virtual
work of the resisting actions) proportionally to the decrease in masonry quality (Borri 1999b)

Figure 3.4 Opus quadratum (Giuffrè 1991)

3.1.1.1 Brick masonry

The wall construction historically is frequently of three solid brick leaves with courses of runners
alternated to courses of stretchers, bonding the leaves together. Commonly the thickness of the
walls at ground floor is about 450 mm reducing to 300 mm at the third floor. Old and ancient brick
masonries had usually very thick sections (from 600mm on) generally with homogeneous
distribution of the bricks in the section then in the outer faces. Sometime only the external leaf of
the masonry was made with whole regular bricks, while the internal part was made with pieces of
bricks and large mortar joints for economic reasons. The joint thickness was usually much lower
than the brick one in a ratio 1-2/5. Nevertheless this was not the case of late Roman architectures
and of Byzantine constructions where the mortar joints were much thicker than in older and more
recent structures. From a survey carried out on Milan Roman walls and on Ravenna Byzantine
walls the following classification could be made (Figure 3.5) (Tedeschi 2004):
a. solid walls with thin joints
b. solid walls with thick joints
c. solid walls with multiple leaves (with different thickness of the leaves)

25
 A) SOLID WALLS WITH THIN JOINTS

128 cm 145 cm

a) St Giovanni in Conca, Milan a) St Nazaro Basilica, Milan

B) SOLID WALLS WITH THICK JOINTS

58 cm 55 cm 66 cm

b) St. Tecla b) St Michele in b) Byzantine

Basilica, Milan Africisco, Ravenna Palace, Ravenna

C) SOLID WALLS WITH MULTIPLE LEAVES

(WITH DIFFERENT THICKNESS OF THE LEAVES)

128 cm 100 cm

c) St. Simpliciano Basilica, Milan c) St Tecla Basilica, Milan

Figure 3.5 Examples of brick masonry section.

The brick disposal can have various arrangement (Figure 3.6-Figure 3.7). Regular brick masonry,
in general shows a good seismic behaviour, related to its easier monoliticity. The possible
damages are related to the possible vulnerability of the structure, rather then to the masonry
quality. Damage could be found in case of local repairs (expulsions), in case of increasing of the
masonry section with a leaf addition or in case of cladding (possible overturning).
Thick masonry walls made by solid bricks but with rough construction technique could be covered
by brick masonry leaves made with regular bricks and mortar joint. It is evident that this leaf grew
up with the wall having regularly courses of header bricks to connect it to the rest of the wall
(Figure 3.8). The other courses are only partially connected with headers and hence in many parts
of the structures only the continuing vertical mortar joint is the (weak) restraint between the leaf
and the internal walls (Binda 2009c). Figure 3.9 summarizes the possible seismic damages when
the connection of the external leaf is not effective (Carocci 2004).
These typologies are indeed recurring in the whole Mediterranean basin area.
For instance, in the Istanbul districts of Fener and Balat (D’Ayala 2004b) 4 types of brickwork were
identified. The most common building material is the solid brick of dimensions 210*105*50 mm set

26
in lime mortar to form two leaves masonry walls (88% of sample). A traditional extruded lightweight
brick of dimensions 300*150*60 is often used to wall up oriels and jetty in a one leaf wall, or at the
upper storeys. Frogged brick imported from France have been surveyed in a minority of cases,
while in some very recent alterations, the use of extruded brick tiles, as infill of reinforced concrete
frames, has been noted.
Commonly the thickness of the walls at ground floor is about 400 mm reducing to 300 mm from the
3rd floor up. Usually the wall is made up of a solid double leaf with sufficient through thickness
connection, while in a minority of cases two leaves brickwork with rubble infill has been recorded.
The overall thickness is greater than the previous case, and the two leaves are usually made of
double brickwork.
In the case of historic brickwork surveyed in the city of Lalitpur, Katmandu Valley, in Nepal
(D’Ayala 2003c) the most common building material is the brick bonded with mud mortar forming
ordinary masonry. There are typically two types of bricks: ordinary sun dried bricks of dimensions
210*105*50 mm, set in mud mortar, and vitrified fired bricks, called dachi aapa, with same
dimensions but a trapezoidal cross section, so that the mud bed-joint is partially covered externally
by the brick. This type of brick is usually used in better quality construction for the facing of external
walls. Because of the vitrified surface and the overlapping over the joints, this wall construction is
substantially impermeable to rain water.
The wall construction historically is of three solid brick leaves with courses of runners alternated to
courses of stretchers, bonding the leaves together. Commonly the thickness of the walls at ground
floor is about 450 mm reducing to 300 mm at the third floor. Another rather common form of
construction is also two leaves brickwork with rubble infill. The overall thickness is greater than the
previous case, and the two leaves are usually made of double brickwork.

Figure 3.6 Examples of regular brick masonry section. a) Single brick, b) two headers, c) one brick and a half

27
 Figure 3.7 Brickwork textures (Mannoni 1994)

a) b) c)

Figure 3.8 View of the cladding connection (a), detail of a cracked brick in the header bond (b) and detachment (c)
(Binda 2009c).

Figure 3.9 Different configuration of cladding connections and possible failures (Carocci 2004)

Another rather common form of construction is also two leaves brickwork with rubble infill. The
overall thickness is greater than the previous case, and the two leaves are usually made of double
brickwork. In fact, in case of thick sections (Figure 3.10), the brickwork can be only an external leaf
and hides the inner rubble masonry, which is the load bearing part of the wall. The quality of the

28
inner material could be very scattered. This typology is frequent in roman massive structures were
the core was a sort of conglomerate, to middle age structures.
Dimension (Figure 3.11) and physical properties of the bricks are very variable in time and
geographically, as well as the mortar composition, its quality and decay.
Traditional mortars were produced with lime, with possible additions of cocciopesto (powdered
bricks), pozzolan or other natural additives in order to have hydraulic reactions, or natural hydraulic
limes. The binder/aggregate ratio is frequently 1/3. Clay or earth mortars could be found in
vernacular buildings. Gypsum mortar could be found. It is important to detect the presence of
gypsum when injections are planned, due to possible sulphate reactions with grouts.
The use of cement mortars is usually related to recent interventions, which could produce salt
damages, as well as the adding of new walls made by modern hollow bricks in recent repairs
(Figure 3.12). In this last situation damages could be caused by the different stiffness and/or the
lack of effective connections between the portions. In case of openings infilling or local
reconstruction, the expulsion is frequent.
The recognising of the mortar composition (binder, aggregate origin, and grain size distribution)
should be carried out by specific laboratory tests and is an important issue in the formulation of
compatible repair materials.

Figure 3.10 Masonry section of the Civic Tower of Pavia (Binda 1992)

Figure 3.11 Example of brick sizes and dimension surveyed in North Italy (Carbonara 2004)

29
 Figure 3.12 Examples of modern brickworks frequently used in recent interventions

3.1.1.2 Stone masonry

The worst defect for a masonry wall is to show no monoliticity in the transversal direction; this can
happen for instance when the wall is made by small pebbles or by two external layers even well
ordered but not mutually connected or containing a rubble infill. This causes the wall to become
more brittle particularly when external forces act in the horizontal direction (Figure 2.18, Figure
2.20, Figure 2.21, Figure 2.28, Figure 3.1, Figure 3.2, Figure 3.13). The same problem can happen
under vertical loads if they act eccentrically or causing the leaves instability (Figure 3.14) (Giuffrè
1993). It is worth to remark that textures appearing regular on façade often do not correspond to
regular morphology in the section (Figure 3.15). Therefore, a correct analysis of the mechanical
behaviour of existing masonry structures, especially when multi-leaf walls are present, cannot
disregard the proper investigation of the arrangement of materials in the thickness.

a)

b) c)

Figure 3.13 Damages after Umbria earthquake: collapse of the outer leaf of the wall (Binda 2003c) and corner collapse
in a building in b) Morocco and c) Greece.

30
 Figure 3.14 Deformation and failure of a two leaves wall for vertical loading.

Figure 3.15 Masonry textures and sections (Binda 2000b, 2003c), (Cardani 2004)

Related to the seismic behaviour of stonework masonries (Figure 3.16) different typologies can be
found (Abbaneo 1993), (Binda 2003b). Four large classes can be distinguished, each one having
subclasses as follows (Figure 3.17):
a. One leaf solid wall
b. Two leaves
c. Three leaves
d. Dry wall
The research carried out by L. Binda and others (Abbaneo 1993), (Binda 2000b), (Binda 2003b),
(Binda 2009d) led to an initial cataloguing of multiple leaf walls based on the percentage of mortar,
stones and voids measured on the area of the cross section (Figure 2.19, Figure 3.18) and to a
subsequent classification based on the number of different layers and on the type of constraint
between them. Whereas the first kind of classification allows evaluating the injectability of the wall,
the second one allows formulating important hypothesis on the static behaviour of the masonry.
Addresses survey forms (Figure 2.19, Figure 3.19) were developed and used to collect information
in pilot study aimed to risk mitigation (Lunigiana and Catania area) and in the post earthquakes
studies (Binda 2000b). A classification of single and multiple leaf masonry sections according to
the number of leaves and their connections and the importance of this knowledge for the
implementation of numerical models is commented in (Giuffrè 1999).

31
Figure 3.16 Qualitative behaviour of a multiple leaf stone Figure 3.17 Abacus of stonework sections (Binda 2003b)
masonry (Binda 2009d)

y [%]
uenc
Freq
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Lombardia

Veneto

Friuli

Trentino

Liguria

stone
Emila Romagna

Toscana

mortar
Umbria

Sicilia

voids

Region

Figure 3.18 Percentage of mortar vs. percentage of stones referred to the area of the cross section of stonework walls in
various Italian regions (Binda 2000b)

32
 Figure 3.19 Example of a masonry survey form (Binda 2000a, 2000b)

Following the previous studies several local catalogues were developed, often accompanying the
regional versions of the handbooks for the compiling of the seismic venerability forms (e.g. Ferrini
2003). Initially referred only to the front texture (Francovich 1988), (Mannoni 1994) (Figure 3.20),
the most recent trends take into account the section classification (Figure 3.21).
It is worth to mention the classification proposed in (Gurrieri 1999), (Avorio 2002), and introduced
in the Region Umbria Code for the post-earthquake financing of the repair intervention (Angeletti
2004). Detailed forms explaining the prevalent masonry typologies in Umbria were developed, with
a prosed procedure for the maosnry quality rough qulification (Figure 3.22)
Furthermore within an Italian National Project RELUIS, a research line was devoted to the
definition of the masonry quality based on visual inspection and limited tests (Binda 2006d,e),
(Borri 2006). The research is aimed to develop a procedure based on visual inspection and limited
tests able to quantify mechanic parameters, after accurate calibrations and statistical correlation.
Several parameters were taken into account, like the courses disposal, the vertical joint staggering,
the homogeneous dimension of the stones, the presence of tie stones, etc. (Figure 3.). To this
purpose several procedures proposed by in literature are applied and compared.

33
 a) b)

Figure 3.20 Catalogues of the surface texture of stone masonry proposed in a) (Mannoni 1994), and b) (Francovich
1988)

Section with leaves

connection

Partial connection of the

leaves

Lack of connection
between the leaves

Figure 3.21 Classification of the masonry section diffused in Umbria (Gurrieri 1999), (Avorio 2002), (Angeletti 2004)

Figure 3.22 Catalogue aimed to the masonry qualification of the typologies diffused in Umbria (Gurrieri 1999), (Avorio
2002), (Angeletti 2004)

34
 Courses Disposal
Horizontal Partial Horizontal Irregular

Vertical Joints
Staggered Partially staggered Partially aligned

Distribution of regular blocks

Prevalence of regular blocks (>75%) Presence of irregular stones 25-50% Presence of irregular stones > 50%

Figure 3.23 The research developed with a RELUIS project financed by the Italian Government is aimed to developed a
procedure based on visual inspection and limited tests able to quantify mechanic parameters, after accurate calibrations
and statistical correlation. Several parameters were taken into account, like the course disposal, the vertical joint
staggering, the homogeneous dimension of the stones, the presence of tie stones, etc. (Binda 2006d,e), (Borri 2006).

35
According to the previous research, Speranza (Speranza 2003) provides a classification of
masonry typologies, which is mainly derived by the surveys following the 1997 Umbria-Marche
earthquake, but is generally applicable to a large number of Mediterranean and European historic
centres. Included typologies, as shown in Figure 3.24, are:
ƒ Solid masonry made up of long shaped stones, roughly squared and placed along
horizontal layers. The connection through the thickness can be considered good (A1).
ƒ Two leaves of dressed stones, roughly squared with some elements through the wall
thickness. The infill between the two leaves is coherent, and the global connection in the
thickness can be estimated as medium (A2).
ƒ Mixed masonry limestone in long dressed elements, small squared stones and rubble. The
fabric layout is characterised by alternate layers of long element placed along the bedding
surface (stretchers), and other placed through the wall thickness (headers). Rubble is often
used to fill gaps between the stones and for the infill, which is incoherent. The overall
connection in the thickness can be assumed as weak (B1).
ƒ Masonry mainly characterised by rubble, with layers nearly horizontal. The fabric layout is
characterised by three/four layers of small stones, alternating with layers made of higher
elements. The cross section is made up of small pieces with a large quantity of weak
mortar. The overall connection through the thickness can be assumed as weak (C1).
ƒ Masonry characterised by rubble of small size with some bigger elements inserted. The tiny
dimensions of fabric elements and the weak quality of mortar do not allow any connection
through the thickness so that this masonry fabric can be considered of very poor quality
(C2).
These typologies of masonry were also surveyed in the historic centre of L’Aquila (D’Ayala 2010)
after April 2009 earthquake.
In both cases the less connected fabrics were more sensitive to total and partial collapses, with the
masonry units and infill losing cohesion due to dynamic excitation. Furthermore the quality of
masonry had high influence on the overall behaviour of buildings: the collapse of horizontal
structures was often due to the deformability of the walls, which remained almost undamaged, but
caused the floor and roof beams to slip out of their supports.

A 70-75 A 70-75

160 160

B B' 120 B B' 120

A1 A2 80
80

40
40

0
0
A' A-A'
A' A-A'

B-B'
B-B'

A 70-75

160

B B' 120

80

40

B1 A'
0
A-A'
70-75

B-B'

A 50
A 65-70
160
160
B B' 120
B B' 120
80
C1 80
C2
40 40

0 0
A-A'
A' A-A'
A'
65-70

B-B'
50

B-B'

Figure 3.24 Masonry fabrics surveyed in Nocera Umbra (Speranza 2003)

36
The use of multi-leaf and dressed masonry is extremely common and widely spread: D’Ayala,
(D’Ayala 2004a) surveyed cavity walls in the city of Bhuj, after the 2001 earthquake, and reports
the common practice of local builders of constructing walls with two external leaves of better quality
dressed stonework and an internal rubble infill; connections between the two external layers are
generally missing. The author also surveyed, in a minority of cases, single-leaf bearing walls,
which were made of either random rubble masonry or semi-dressed/ dressed stone masonry. They
generally performed better, although the author acknowledges that the use of light-weight iron
trusses for roofing could equally be the reason for reduced damage. Conversely, the lack of
adequate connection between the leaves of the three-leaf masonry caused extensive damage.
Such damage and out-of-plane deformation in general was less in those cases where L shaped
corner stones had been used as quoins.
Rubble masonry walls were also surveyed in Moroccan foundouks by Houet (Houet 2004).
Typically walls of buildings in the Medina, the city centre, are composed of rubble of various sizes
packed together like a dry stone wall. The thickness of the walls varies from building to building,
but on average panels are at least 400mm thick. The stones are held together by a lime and clay
mortar, which is not very weatherproof and, for this reason, walls are covered with a lime and mud
render, called “tadellakt”. This mixture is applied in layers containing more and more lime as it gets
closer to the exterior surface. This give the wall a more durable, yet irregular or unlevelled finish,
due to thick exterior coat (2-3cm).
The masonry walls of Porto (or Porto region) built from the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century
consist of medium to large size stones (50cm to 90cm measured diagonally) often arranged in
layers (relatively regular), with stone wedges and lime mortar closing the joints. Although
classifications concerning the dimension of the stones already exist, (Binda 2000b), the large
dimension of the stone blocks often found in Porto (and outside) walls demanded a new
arrangement: large: greater than 80.0cm; medium: between 50.0cm e 80.0cm; small: between
10.0cm e 50.0cm; very small: less than 10.0cm.
The stones are granite, changing from yellow (softer, i.e. more degraded) to blue (stiffer), have a
rectangular type shape and exhibit reasonable good mechanical properties. The mortar joints show
variable thickness (0.5 to 2.0cm), cream colour and are quite brittle.
The geometry of Porto houses, deeper than larger, makes the side walls to be the main vertical
elements that support the floor beams. These walls, often shared by two buildings, are made of
one leaf and are 30.0cm to 50.0cm thick. A large study has been done at LESE on this type of
walls, in particular, the quantities of each material were evaluated using image processing
resorting to computational tools, and a large experimental campaign was, and still is being
performed on these walls. On the contrary, the main façades of the buildings present openings and
are made of two leaves, being more than 50.0cm thick. Figure 3.25 and Figure 3.26 show the
example of different textures and cross section of wall panels.

Figure 3.25 Different textures of stone masonry wall.

37
 (a) (b)

Figure 3.26 Typologies of cross section: (a) one leaf stone and (b) double leaf stone.

The characterization of such walls needs a thorough investigation of the geometry (elevation and
cross-section) and the constitutive materials to identify the walls’ texture and cross-section and the
evaluation of percentage of their constituents (stone, mortar and voids). The quantities of each
material were evaluated using image processing resorting to computational tools. Figure 3.27 and
Figure 3.28 show the example of the elevation and cross-section of walls panels after image
processing.
The cross section of the surveyed walls shows a widespread distribution of voids, more evidenced
in the section midline. In fact, the mortar was originally placed along the border lines, without filling
the inside where the absence of mortar is quite visible, creating cavities due to the irregular shape
of both upper and lower stone faces contact. The stones have a rectangular type shape and exhibit
reasonable good mechanical conditions. The size of the stones is very variable.

38
 Walls’ texture Types of elements

Texture: Irregular

Wedges: yes

Stone: granite
Shape: irregular
Size: medium/large

Mortar: lime and sand

Texture: joints irregulars

Wedges: yes
Stone: granite
Shape: irregular
Size: medium
lime and sand
Mortar:
(1:3)
Texture: regular

Wedges: yes
Stone: granite
Shape: regular
Size: large
Lime and sand
Mortar:
(1:3)

Texture: regular

Wedges: no
Stone: granite
Shape: regular
Size: large

Mortar: -

Figure 3.27 Examples of elevation survey, one leaf stone masonry.

39
 Cross-section

       

232

220
226

30.0cm thick 40.0cm thick 50.0cm thick

Figure 3.28 Examples of cross-section survey, one leaf stone masonry.

In the past, building stones were material locally available, often round pebbles from rivers and
creeks (Figure 3.29). In this case, the size has a great importance because reduced dimensions
implies multi-leaves sections and worst seismic behaviour, even if empirical rules and detailing
were developed to improve the masonry behaviour.
Regular ashlar or block textures could hide an inner rubble masonry. Similarly to brickwork
masonry, massive sections as pillars could have only a regular leaf in the perimeter and a rubble
core of variable consistence (Figure 3.30).
Furthermore, ancient monumental buildings were frequently built by monolithic elements, large
stone blocks or lintels (Figure 3.31).
Monolithic sections were frequently used for columns, from ancient time up to now. The columns
could be composed by drums coupled by metal or hard wood pins and bounded with lead (Figure
3.32).
The column drums were connected by metal dowels which were fixed with lead, and the regular
blocks of the walls were fixed by metal clamps and lead as in general horizontal masonry
practices, with no mortar used (Figure 3.33-Figure 3.34). Another construction feature commonly
suggested as an earthquake preventative is the means used to join huge blocks together. It is
believed that copper was used at Tiahuanaco, both of which are soft metals. It has also been
suggested that these 'ties' were employed to 'ground' structures properly (often made of
conducting Quartzite).
To make sure everything looked regular and aligned properly, the final carving was saved until all
the blocks were in place. The stone was worked down with chisels until it was finally smoothed by
small stones and sand. If it was marble, it could be further polished with leather. Completely
finished stones seemed to be reserved for only the most important buildings, as it took a lot of
detailed work.
The insertion of metals constraints allowed the tying of large blocks but also the possibility to
reduce the building time as in case of bridges. Figure 3.34c shows the section of the Mostar
Bridge, built reducing the supporting time by scaffolding due to the torrential river.
Architectonic details were often reinforced by metals clamps or rods (Figure 3.35).

40
 Figure 3.29 Main stone shapes diffused in Italy (Carbonara 2004)

Figure 3.30 Example of three leaf stone masonry pillars: Cathedrals of Pavia, Noto and Milan

Figure 3.31 Hollowed and extended beams: sections with oblique projection: a) lintel of temple. B) Architrave of temple.
c) Architrave of Athenian treasury) column drum. e) Ceiling beam) cross-beam.

Figure 3.32 Details of column drums

41
 Figure 3.33 Tied stone-blocks: a) The U-Shape holes on top, here for levers rather than cranes because of the small
stone size. b) The dove-tail clamp connecting the top of the two stones c-f) Preliminary finishing.

Figure 3.34 a), b) Stone masonries made by tied large stone blocks and c) detail of the Mostar Bridge

Figure 3.35 Architectonic details reinforced by metals elements

3.1.1.3 Mixed brick-stone masonry

Mixed brick-stone masonry were diffused since the Roman time (Figure 3.36). If the brickwork is
regularly arranged in the wall and crossing the masonry section, it can connect the leaves of the
stonework masonry, improving the seismic behaviour (Figure 3.37a). In North Italy, since roman
time and particularly in Gothic period, masonry was frequently built with alternate layers of inclined
pebbles and bricks (Figure 3.38).
In other situation, bricks or tiles can be irregularly placed in the masonry (Figure 3.36, Figure 3.39).

Figure 3.36 Mixed stone/brick typologies: texture arrangement. 1) sub-horizontal coursed with ashlars and small pebbles
between the blocks; 2) with horizontal courses of bricks and ashlars regularly positioned in the masonry ; 3) bricks

42
 placed vertically and horizontally around each stone elements; 4) regular coursed of bricks alternate to irregular
stonemasonry (Frankovich 1988).

a) b) c)

Figure 3.37 Mixed stone-brick sections. a) from the Cesariano’s version of Vitruvio treatise b) c) from (Gurrieri 1999),
(Ferrini 2003)

a) b) c) d) e)

Figure 3.38 Mixed stone-brick textures. a) brick work layers alternate to ashlar bricks masonry b) rounded pebbles and
c), d) insertions of tiles and bricks between stones, irregular texture e) insertions of tiles and bricks between stones,
regular texture

Figure 3.39 Church in the Medieval site of Mystras (stone masonry with stones surrounded by solid bricks-the so-called
“plinthoperikleisti”). Stone blocks alternate to bricks is diffused masonry in Byzantine buildings. However this type of
masonry is a three—leaf masonry. The interior leaf is made of rubble stone masonry. Poor quality filling material is
placed between the two leaves.

3.1.1.4 Timber reinforced masonry.

Other masonry typologies could be the mixed masonry-timber structures.
As reported in (Vinzeleou 2010), the survey of numerous monuments and historic structures in
Greece - a country situated in the most earthquake prone area of Eastern Mediterranean - has
revealed a systematic and continuous through-centuries use of timber elements within masonry.
43
This observation could be easily extended to whole the Mediterranean countries and not only. The
extent of the use of timber in the structures, the contribution of the timber to the overall structural
system, the specific measures taken to protect timber from decay and, hence, the efficiency of the
developed structural systems do present a vast variety, associated with social and economical
factors. This extensive use of timber makes it legitimate to assume that our predecessors were
aware of the effect of timber reinforcing systems on the seismic behaviour of structures.
(Vinzeleou 2010) provides information on the use of timber in structures in Greece ranging from
the Minoan Crete-2.500 years B.C., to Akrotiri, Thera - 16th century b.C., to Byzantine churches
and Monasteries, and finally to more than 70 urban nuclei within the country-developed in the 18th
and 19th centuries.
In several cases the damage revealed unexpected large timber beams imbedded in the walls near
the top with a tie function. It is not known how widespread the use of horizontal timber ties is.
Timber elements could be used as horizontal tie running along the perimeter of the building at
regular intervals or as a frame, which contribute to the overall structure behaviour.

3.1.1.4.1 Timber-tied stone masonry

In Greece, as well as in the entire region of eastern Mediterranean, systematic and continuous in-
time use of timber reinforcement is observed in masonry structures (Figure 3.40). Timber-laced
stone masonry walls may commonly be found in two storey buildings in Bosnia and Herzegovina
as inheritance of Ottoman period in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 15th-19th century. Timber elements
are combined with masonry in various structural systems, both in monumental structures (such as
palaces and churches) and in residential buildings. The architectural, historical and socio-economic
study of those structural systems is quite advanced.
Horizontal timber tie consists of more than one longitudinal timber element, running along the
perimeter of the building and by transverse timber elements that connect the longitudinal ones at
regular intervals. Rubble stone masonry or three leaf stone masonry are the most commonly met
construction types. Lime mortar or lime-pozzolan mortar was used; in a number of cases, clay
mortar was also found. The thickness of masonry varies between 0.70m and 0.90m (depending on
the number of storeys, the length of the wall between transverse walls, the actions to be resisted
by the building, etc.). In the case histories studied in (Vintzileou 2008) wood from coniferous or
chestnut trees is used. The typical sectional dimensions of the longitudinal timber elements are in
the case histories reported in (Vintzileou 2008) 100x100 mm or 80x80 mm concerning Greece, or
120x120mm to 140x140mm in the case histories reported in (Humo 2008) in Bosnia and
Herzegovin. The size are in general depending on the thickness of masonry, as well as on the
number of longitudinal timber elements within the thickness of the wall. The typical sectional
dimensions of the transverse timber elements are 0.06x0.06 m.
In some cases, only one longitudinal element is used. It is located either close to the longitudinal
axis of the wall or close to its interior face (where it serves also as support of the timber beams of
the floor). The most common case is that of a pair of longitudinal elements (Figure 3.41), located
either at the two faces of masonry or at a distance from them (mainly, to protect the wood from
humidity). There are, however, some cases in which three longitudinal elements were used or, in
some extreme cases, the width of the timber elements is equal to the thickness of the wall (Figure
3.41).
In case of two joists (double lacing) in Bosnia and Herzegovin (Humo 2008) it is common to find
lateral timber joists connecting longitudinal joists typically at 1500 to 2000mm centres. It is
assumed that timber-lacing acts like reinforced concrete ring beams in contemporary masonry and
thus improves seismic response of the masonry structure (Figure 3.42).
Timber ties act as flexural and shear reinforcement and increase the deformability of masonry
(Figure 3.43).
The main problem of timber reinforced systems is the time degradation of wood.
When transverse timber elements are simply resting on the longitudinal ones, connection of the
two exterior leaves of masonry may not be sufficient (Figure 3.44).

44
 Figure 3.40 Timber reinforced building in Greece from (Vintzileou 2008)

Figure 3.41 Arrangement of longitudinal timber elements within the thickness of masonry (NTUA/EPPO 2005)
(Vintzileou 2008)

45
Masonry section with timber lacing: poor or absence of connection between the stone masonry leaves and
decay of the timber lacing

Timber roof structure

Timber floor structure

Timber window lintel

Outer timber lacing Timber floor structure Decayed and destroyed

outer timber lacing
Stone masonry wall, Decayed and destroyed
Inner timber lacing inner timber lacing
outer leaf, outside
Stone masonry wall,
outer leaf, inside Collapse of
the inner core
Stone masonry wall,
inner core

Undamaged stage. Start of the collapse. Collapse development.

Three-leaf masonry wall with double Decay of inner timber lacing leads Progressive overturning leads to
timber lacing at floor level. to overturning of the upper the destruction of the decayed
masonry assemblage and start of outer timber lacing, further
the collapse of the inner core collapse of the inner core and
constructed with rubble stone and separation of outer leaves.
poor hydrated lime mortar.

Local collapse of the façade wall. Detail of the collapse. View from Detail of the collapse. View from
outside. inside
Figure 3.42 Damages on a timber framed masonry (Humo 2008)

Figure 3.43 Timber ties act as flexural and shear reinforcement and increase the deformability of masonry

46
Figure 3.44 When transverse timber elements are simply resting on the longitudinal ones, connection of the two exterior
leaves of masonry may not be sufficient.

3.1.1.4.2 Timber framed masonry

A remarkable building technique concerns the wall framing by timber elements. The technique has
several local variety, and it was in general considered very effective for its seismic behaviour. It is
worth to remind its diffusion in the 19th century for the extensive reconstruction after catastrophic
earthquakes, as in Portugal (Lisbon), Italy (Reggio Calabria), or in Greece (island of Lefkada).
In Reggio Calabria, the use of timber reinforcement against earthquakes evolved into a patented
system known as the Casa Baraccata, but the most famous case histories is related to “Baixa
Pombalina”, the historical downtown of Lisbon rebuilt after the great earthquake of 1755 (Paula
2006), (Cóias e Silva 2002).
“Pombaline” is the term coined after the Marquis of Pombal, the prime minister at the time of the
1755 earthquake, who took most of the decisions regarding the reconstruction of Lisbon.
One of the most remarkable features of the buildings which make up this area is their structural
concept, the distinctive “gaiola” system, introduced after that earthquake.
In line with the post earthquake measures designed by the chief engineer, Manuel da Maia, the
new buildings during the first decades of reconstruction after the big shake incorporated a set of
features intended to provide them with adequate seismic behaviour, enabling them to resist
horizontal loads and to dissipate substantial amounts of energy. Among these measures, the so
called “gaiola” or “cage” system stands out (Figure 3.45). The system consists of a set of timber
members embedded along the inner face of the main stone masonry façade walls. To
these members and to the ashlars around the openings, an internal timber grid is connected by
means of iron cross ties. Further bracing is provided by the timber floors, whose diaphragm action
is enhanced by iron ties, bolted to the floor beams and deeply embedded in masonry main walls,
and by timber connectors, named “hands”, nailed to the above mentioned timber grid and also
embedded in the masonry. The confined facade pilasters are then connected to a two-directional
vertical bracing system of timber framed walls with light ceramic and rubble masonry infill (Figure
3.46). Often small stones and ceramic elements were recovered from the ruins of the earthquake
and then assembled with lime mortar (Paula 2006).

Figure 3.45 Details of the Pombaline construction (Paula 2006), (Cóias e Silva 2002)

47
 Figure 3.46 Examples of the composite timber-masonry walls: three main types of internal timber arrangement. From
(Paula 2006), (Cóias e Silva 2002).

Another relevant example concerns the island of Lefkada described in (Vinzeleou 2007), a local
structural system was developed before the 19th century in Lefkada. The strong earthquake which
occurred in 1821, proved the adequacy of the system to sustain seismic actions. Thus, the British
Authorities (ruling the Ionian Islands at that time) imposed rules for the construction of new houses
following the main characteristics of this local structural system. These rules, further developed
and completed, constituted the Code for Construction, issued in 1827. That Code provided
guidance on the selection of building materials, on the thickness of stone masonry in the ground
floor, as well as on the maximum storey height. Typical buildings (one- to maximum three-storey
buildings) consist of a stone masonry ground floor plus one or two timber framed brick masonry
storeys. Intermediate floors and roof are made of timber (Figure 3.47). The roof is covered with
tiles. Openings are practically symmetrically arranged in plan. To protect the timber framed
masonry from humidity, the upper storeys used to be covered along the exterior façade by timber
planks.
Bearing walls in the ground floor (typically, perimeter walls) are no more than 3.0 m high and they
are made of stone masonry (0.60–1.00 m thick). The external leaf of walls is made with roughly cut
stones, whereas cut stones are used in the corners of the building, as well as along the perimeter
of openings (Figure 3.47). Rubble stones are used in the internal leaf of ground floor walls. The
space between the two leaves is filled with small size stones mixed with pieces of bricks and
mortar. In addition to masonry walls, a secondary (timber) bearing system is present in the ground
floor which consists of timber columns arranged close to the masonry walls. The timber frame of
the perimeter walls is connected to the ground floor masonry through timber beams, arranged
along the perimeter of the stone masonry walls. Metal ties (of various geometry and size, are used
to connect these timber elements of the floor with the stone masonry and/or with the timber frame
of the upper storeys.

Figure 3.47 Typical morphology of timber-framed walls. (Vintzileou 2007)

The peculiarity of this structural system, which has sustained several strong earthquakes, lies in
the secondary timber structural system provided to all buildings (Figure 3.48). As proven by survey
and calculations, the secondary system (too flexible to contribute to the seismic behaviour of the
building) is able to safely sustain vertical loads, in case the masonry of the walls between ground
and first floor is severely damaged or even collapsed due to a seismic event. Thus, the structure

48
remains safe and gives the population the time that is necessary for repair or reconstruction of the
damaged masonry.
In several cases, extensive decay of the timber elements was observed due to biological attack
(favoured by high percentage of humidity) (Figure 3.49). The form of this damage though obviously
not attributed to the earthquake is mentioned herein, since it has affected the seismic behaviour of
the buildings. In fact, the reduction, which was observed in some cases, of the sectional
dimensions of the timber beam serving as support to the upper storey(s) perimeter masonry walls
led to the transfer of loads directly to the secondary timber system of the ground floor.
Thus, the upper storey(s) were supported only by the flexible secondary bearing system (i.e., by
the timber columns).
Secondary timber bearing system (timber columns and connections): In this case too, reduction of
the sectional dimensions of the timber elements was observed due to decay.
Intermediate (timber) floors: The decay of timber beams due to environmental and biological
actions led, in some cases, to a reduction of their cross-sectional dimensions and, by way of
consequence, to large permanent deflections of the floors.
Timber framed masonry: Similar damages were observed in the timber elements of this system as
well. In addition, cracks were observed in several cases between brick masonry and surrounding
timber elements (Figure 3.49a). In a limited number of cases, out of plane collapse of the filling
masonry was observed.

Figure 3.48 Typical house of the historic center of Lefkada, (a) The bearing system (schematic, sketch by P. Touliatos),
(b)The function of the secondary timber system (schematic, sketch by P. Touliatos)

Figure 3.49 Typical damage of the Lefkada masonry and advanced decay of timber elements along the perimeter of
stone masonry (Vinzeleou 2007).

3.1.1.5 Earth construction: Adobe / Unfired Earth Block / Rammed Earth / Cob
Load-bearing earth construction (illustrated in Figure 3.50) can be subdivided into:
Adobe, or (unfired) Earth Blocks / Rammed Earth, Taipa or Pisé / Cob

49
 Figure 3.50 Different earth building techniques: adobe, rammed earth, cob (from left to right)

These differ in mechanical, physical and chemical properties. While in general terms their seismic
behaviour is brittle, parametric studies comparing structural behaviour in terms of building
technique (whether static or dynamic) are few in the literature. One exception is in (Vargas
Neumann 1993). The understanding and modelling of structural behaviour of earth structures is
limited by a lack of consistent testing of the mechanical properties of their constituent materials.
3.1.1.5.1 Adobe / Unfired Earth Block
Adobe is a Spanish term indicating earth blocks. For the purposes of this project, the term adobe
shall be used throughout.
Adobe walls are non-monolithic structural elements consisting of masonry units (adobe) and
mortar. In order to produce adobes, soil is mixed with fibers and if necessary with sand. After a
certain amount of time in which the resulting paste “matures”, the mixture is formed into blocks by
means of moulds, and air dried.
Construction takes place by using alternating layers of adobe and mortar, whose binder in adobe
structures is usually silt and clay fraction.
Some typical masonry units and wall typologies found in historic adobe structures are shown in
Figure 3.51 Mortar used in adobe construction is usually based on an earth binder (sometimes
combined with lime, CORPUS 2010a), whereas sand, gravel and chopped straw are used as
aggregates. Joint thickness (tj) varies from tight, 0,1 tm (tm is masonry unit thickness to broad 0,5 tm
< tj = 1 tm. Wall thickness varies between 30 – 150 cm. Typical adobe wall typologies are shown in
Figure 3.51. In many historical adobe buildings, wall slenderness is (height-to-thickness) is < 5.
Walls are in some cases tapering.

Figure 3.51 Examples of adobe unit sizes and wall (non exhaustive)

50
Adobe structures are the only earthen structures listed in the 1998 European Macroseismic Scale
(Grunthal 1998), according to which, together with rubble stone, they are the most vulnerable to
earthquakes. Data gathered after the destruction caused by the 1994 Northridge Earthquake
indicates that a peak ground acceleration (pga) of 0.1-0.2 g is sufficient to initiate damage in
well-maintained unreinforced adobe masonry buildings (Webster 2006).
Adobe seems to fail from cracks in the mortar, with cracks usually following stepped patterns along
the mortar joints (Vargas Neumann 2006), (Hardwick 2010).
3.1.1.5.2 Rammed Earth
Rammed earth is also known as taipa (Portuguese) or pisé (French). For the purposes of this
project, the term rammed earth shall be used. Unlike adobe walls, rammed earth walls are
homogeneous, monolithic structural elements. Both the term rammed earth (to ram) and the term
pise´ (archaic French, pisér “to crush”) refer to the compaction of the constituent materials. The
material (earth, sometimes with straw, lime or gravel), after being left to soak, is placed in the
formwork and compacted using a heavy wooden tool, or rammer. Once one layer is compacted,
another layer of earth is placed in the formwork and the process repeated until the formwork is full
and therefore removed to complete another section of the wall, first horizontally, and then
vertically.
Historic rammed earth walls therefore consist of modules laid without mortar, the size of which
depends on the dimensions of the formwork used. Each layer if known as a lift, and at many
historic rammed earth sites material such as lime, straw, stones and bricks is placed between the
lifts (Jaquin 2006).
Historic rammed earth walls are formed by ramming layers of earthen material (usually lime and
earth in varying proportions) within formwork. Each layer of rammed earth is known as a lift. Sizes
reported (CORPUS 2010a) for each module (what is rammed within one formwork box) are 1-3
metres length and 30-50cm height, but the author has observed layer heights up to 1m. According
to whether the formwork is fastened externally or internally, holes are present. (Jaquin 2006a).
Different typologies of rammed earth walls are shown in Figure 3.52.
No mortar is used between units but in some cases lime, straw, stones, turf, vegetable matter or
bricks are rammed between layers. Langenbach (Langenbach 2004) and Hurd (Hurd 2006)
suggest that these ‘mattresses’ between layers are a seismic protection measure since they force
diagonal shear cracks to propagate horizontally thus preventing collapse. Even when no layers are
placed between lifts, the construction process causes the bond between lifts to be weaker than
bonds compacted within the formwork (Jaquin 2006a).The thickness of rammed earth walls is
determined by the formwork in which it is rammed. Walls are therefore one-leaf. Joints are
“staggered”, as in brick masonry.
(Vargas Neumann 1993) describes research carried out to assess the performance of rammed
earth walls under seismic loading, with the aim of identifying parameters which influence seismic
vulnerability. Parameters chosen and tested were: soil granulometry, humidity content,
compactation level, use of natural additives, and “joint treatment”, i.e. presence of materials
between layers. The results of the study, which was conducted in order to allow comparison of
rammed earth walls with adobe walls, showed a higher resistance and deformation of rammed
earth walls in comparison with adobe walls (up to 40%). Current anti-Seismic buildings codes for
earth buildings (NZS 1997) do not take this difference in consideration.

51
 Figure 3.52 Different typologies of rammed earth walls, after (Jaquin 2006a)

3.1.1.5.3 Cob
Cob is a mixture of clay subsoil, aggregate and straw. Walls are built without shuttering on a stone
plinth. Literature on the subject of cob in seismic areas is known by the author to be limited to
(Langenbach 2004) but it is documented the presence of cob and its repair methods (as well as
adobe and rammed earth) in Central Asia, in relation to seismic and other structural damage.
Extensive testing on the compressive strength, density and Young´s Modulus in relation to
moisture content was carried out by Ziegert (Ziegert 2003).
3.1.1.5.4 Pre-existing conditions
Unlike some other historic structural materials, earth buildings are highly susceptible to Cracking,
Rising Damp and Salt Damage, Erosion, Termite Infestation, and generally loss of section cause
irregularities in strength, stiffness and mass which mainly contribute to poor performance under
earthquake conditions.
Structures affected by these conditions will clearly be affected at lower pga than the 0.1-0.2g
reported by Webster (Webster 2006) to start damage in adobe buildings.
Taking Bam, Iran, as an example, the collapse mechanisms theories proposed in (Kayano 2004)
do suffice in explaining why some of the dwellings were still standing after the earthquake
(Langenbach 2004), (JSEE 2004). Langenbach´s explanation is that the conditions of the buildings
at the time of the earthquake was very poor.
While (JSEE 2004), who noticed the good performance of the arch roof of the old adobe buildings,
attributes the failure of other buildings to improper and lack of seismic safety consideration in the
restoration program and the presence of heavy roofs and walls, as well as the lack of structural

52
integrity especially in newly built buildings, Langenbach (2004) attributes the catastrophic collapse
of the Arg-e Bam to internal wall degradation.

Cracking
Cracking in earthen buildings is common as from the moment they are built, and is set off by
shrinkage straight after construction. Shrinkage cracking is then worsened by conditions such as
weathering and differential settlement.
Rising Damp, Salt Damage and Erosion
The influence of moisture and salt content on the compressive strength of earthen materials has
been extensively researched by Ziegert (Ziegert 2003). A detailed analysis of the erosion process
in relation to rising damp and salt damage, can be found in (Fujii 2009).

3.1.2 Damage mechanisms

3.1.2.1 Walls
As demonstrated by the post-earthquake damage surveys carried out after all earthquakes
affecting areas where masonry buildings are common, one of the main sources of vulnerability for
such structures is associated to local failure modes, mainly due to out-of plane response of walls
(Giuffrè 1993), (Doglioni 1994), (Lagomarsino 1997), (Binda 1999a,b), (Borri 1999a), (D’Ayala
1999a,b), (Zuccaro 2003) (Figure 3.53). The building seismic response can be governed by such
mechanisms when connections between orthogonal walls and between walls and floors are
particularly poor. This is often the case in existing stone masonry buildings without tie rods, with
lack of interlocking at the connection of intersecting walls, presence of simply supported wooden
floors and thrusting roofs. Only if connections are improved by proper devices (e.g. tie-rods), local
mechanisms can be prevented and a global behaviour governed by the wall in-plane response can
develop.

Figure 3.53 Damage after the earthquake in Messina in 1908 (Giuffrè 1993)

The kinematic mechanism of a single panel can be classified related to the masonry quality, the
boundary conditions or constraints which could involve simple overturning, vertical and horizontal
bending and mixed overturning mechanisms.
Masonry quality and local discontinuities, such as the placement of chimneys flues in the plane of
the masonry bearing walls or new openings and closure of previous openings or the building
evolution, affect the mechanism.
Furthermore, the damage present in a structure can be the result of continuous modifications
taking place over the life time of the building. The position of the load bearing and non load bearing
walls could have been modified, new floors inserted, or doors and windows opened, etc., in
different time, with different building technologies and materials, as well (Figure 3.54-Figure 3.57).
All these modifications can change the global and local behaviour of the walls under the different
actions, especially seismic actions, which tend to separate the subsequent additions or produce
hammering, as shown in Figure 3.54.

53
The damages could affect both added portions or small volumes but also superstructures. In this
last case frequent mistakes, like the construction of walls or pillars directly on floors, or the change
of the building technology can have catastrophic effects (Figure 3.55-Figure 3.56).
Damages caused by the opening infilling or local dismantling and building of the new window/door
frames can be surveyed, indicating the low compatibility of the new masonry technology with the
previous. Furthermore, the insertion of new opening shows a scarce attention to the load bearing
walls or the floor loading (Doglioni 2007) (Figure 3.57).
The presence of discontinuities can be visually detected or found by non destructive techniques
such as thermovision, sonic or radar tests. It is important to identify and map their presence
because the lack of continuity will locally change the stiffness of the wall.
Environmental decay can affect masonry walls, reducing the load bearing section; the decay
generally starts from the mortar joint erosion (Figure 3.58).

a) b)

Figure 3.54 a) Crack pattern revealing the evolution of the building (Binda 2005a) b) Damage (Doglioni 2007)

Figure 3.55 Crack pattern revealing the superstructure (Doglioni 2007)

a) b)

Figure 3.56 Typical additions of upper storeys in Ortigia (Giuffrè 1993) and frequent mistake (Doglioni 2007)

54
 Figure 3.57 Damage caused by the opening infilling local dismantling and building of the new opening frame. It is
remarkable in the case the scarce attention to the floor loading (Doglioni 2007)

a) b)

Figure 3.58 Load bearing reduction due to decay a) (Binda 1997a) b) (Doglioni 2007)

In plane behaviour
In plane behaviour of masonry panels generally involves an effective overall building configuration,
as already commented in paragraph 2.2.1, preventing brittle out-of-plane failures. The seismic
behaviour could be considered “second way mechanisms”, according Giuffrè definition (Giuffrè
1993) because the relative damage (shear cracks), generally does not lead the structure to
collapse, in comparison with the out-of-plane mechanisms.
Nevertheless, the shear damage of a panel could trigger the out of plane mechanism of the
connected walls (mixed mechanisms). Kinematics chains describe the in-plane rigid rotation of the
resisting structural portions of the building, defined by particular geometrical (dimensions of septa,
openings) and bond conditions (connections, presence of ties), subjected to in-plane horizontal
actions.
In general the shear damages of masonry panels is reveals by crack patterns of Figure 2.5, Figure
2.7, Figure 3.59, Figure 3.60.
Similarly to masonry, the in-plane failure modes of the earthen walls subjected to the vertical and
horizontal loads are of three types:
(a) Failure by slip: The wall undergoes a relative displacement along a plan of low shear strength
such as the joint of horizontal mortar (adobe), the construction joint of built (cob), …
(b) Failure under bending: The wall behaves like a cantilever beam subjected to bending moment
and axial force.
(c) Shear damage characterized by the formation of the diagonal cracks.

55
 Figure 3.59 In plane failures

α α α
α
δ =ψ
δ =ψ1 δ =ψ2 δ =ψ3
δ =α ψ
δ δ δ

Ψ2
Ψ3

Ψ1
Ψ
a) b)

Figure 3.60 From (Valluzzi 2007). Scheme of the in-plane kinematics model for a wall under in-plane actions: a) single
wall, b) multiple-wall system (Giuffrè 1993). Symbols in figure are as follows: N is vertical load acting at distance αL from
compressed edge, P is weight of detaching portion and T is tensile force in tie, obtained by difference between the
weight cQ of supported portion of wall and counteraction (q) allowed from supporting base of wall.

Figure 3.61 The layout of the crack will depend on the dimensions of the units and the overall wall, while the type of
mechanism, sliding (a), overturning (b) or mixed (c) will depend also on the loading conditions.

The formation of an in-plane crack is a function of the geometry of the wall and shape ratio of the
unit and is independent of the crack angle: this means that, whatever the position of the crack, for
c<αb , the total shear strength is constant and equivalent to the portion of a triangular wall
identified by the angle α b and the height H of the wall considered (seeFigure 3.61). For αc≥αb, on
the other hand, the Ctot becomes independent of the block shape ratio. (D:Ayala 2003b).
The above approach can be applied to a wall with openings (Figure 3.62) by subdividing it into
vertical piers and horizontal spandrels, depending on its number of storeys, while the lateral
deformability of the wall, whether governed by flexure or shear, will depend on the relative stiffness
of piers and spandrels. This in turn will define the redistribution of the external forces among piers,
their crack pattern and their ultimate load factor. Hence the problem still reduces to the definition of
a collapse mechanism (overturning or shear), a collapse load factor, and an angle of crack. The
result will be dependent on the angle of friction chosen, the geometry of the masonry unit, and the
geometry of the wall and its openings. In general in a real wall, openings will have different size
and ratios, and will not be distributed regularly, so that there will be differences in geometry and
hence capacity, among the piers. The spandrels can also have different height.

56
In order to extend the procedure, the assumptions made are that the wall as a whole is defined by
one width (L) and one height (Hw); the number of openings at each storey is variable; the size of
the opening is constant at each storey (ls) and can be obtained as average of the real sizes.
Under these conditions the weakest pier alignment can be identified on the basis of the geometric
parameters. However the procedure allows calculating more than one pier alignment in succession
if so required (Casapulla 2006).

Figure 3.62 Possible crack lines in a multistorey piers and spandrels. A uniformly distributed load due to the live loads
and horizontal structures is assumed to act at each storey level. hf and hs are the inter storey height and the height of the
spandrel, respectively, Hp=(Hf-hs/2) is the variable height of the pier, with Hf=nhf the variable height of wall considered at
each iteration depending on the number of storeys n, and hence hf≤Hf≤Hw, with Hw total height of the wall.

A relatively common case is represented by facades with porticos or piers at the ground floor. In
this case for the in plane mechanism the most vulnerable part tends to be the ground floor. The
mechanism development and calculation are included in Figure 3.63.

Mechanism Load factor

Lp (ε + β ) ⋅ Ctot G
λ= +
Hp ⎛ Wp ⎞
⎜⎜ m ⋅ + WG ⎟⎟
⎝ 2 ⎠
m = number of pillars; Lp= width of pillars in the plane of the facade.
Hp= height of pillars; Wp= weight of each pillar;
WG = weight of facade portion above colonnade;
ε= Number of connection between façade wall and orthogonal edge walls (0-2);
M β= Number of internal bearing walls orthogonal to the façade;
CtotG = Total shear strength exerted by orthogonal edge walls (lateral and internal)
L

2
3 HG
W
1
G
HG
Ctot ( ) Ctot ( )
W
G
H
F
W
N-z

Gp Gp Gp
Hp
Wp Wp Wp

Lp

Contribution of restraint by orthogonal walls

Figure 3.63 Mechanism of collapse for in plane overturning for presence of porticoes (D’Ayala 2003a)

57
Simple overturning
The simple overturning of external walls could be considered as one the most frequent and brittle
collapse mechanism. The mechanism involves a rigid rotation of a wall or a of portion of a wall
around a horizontal hinge (Figure 3.64). The out of plane actions due to the earthquake start the
mechanism.

a) b)

c)

Figure 3.64 Overturning of the whole façade and of a portion a) (Giuffrè 1993), b) (Borri 2004c), c) (Doglioni 1999)

In the worst situation, the wall is free on top, without any restrain, and not connected to the lateral
orthogonal walls. Weak connection could activate the mechanism, as well as shove actions from
beams, tie beams, etc.
The boundary conditions are, in general, the lack of effective connections and constraints.
The mechanism is easy recognisable by vertical crack patterns between the wall and the
orthogonal lateral walls and the presence of horizontal cracks (Figure 3.66). In some cases, the
floor beams collapse (Figure 3.64).
Different masonry portions, local damages and opening geometry could start the overturning. The
mechanism could be limited to one or more building floors (Figure 2.11, Figure 3.64, Figure 3.65),
related to the floor connection, masonry typologies, restrain geometry etc. In the Italian code, the
collapse index has to be calculated for several position of the horizontal hinge.
In multiple leaf masonry the collapse could involve only the external leaf, with a reasonable
decrease of the collapse index (Figure 3.1, Figure 3.2, Figure 3.53). Figure 3.67 shows some
example of damaged structures.

58
Mechanism Load factor
j
Ti 2 h r
⎡T j
⎤
L + β s j 2 μsb∑ + kL ⎢ N + μhs j + ∑ ⋅ (Ti + ΔT + μhs ( j − i ))⎥
l
∑
i =1 2 3 l =1 r ⎣ 2 = ⎦
λ (0), j =
i 1

⎡ j ⎛ 1⎞ ⎛ j
⎞⎤
hs ⎢∑ LTi ⎜ j − i + ⎟ + kL⎜⎜ j + ∑ ( j − i )⎟⎟⎥
⎣ i =1 ⎝ 2 ⎠ ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎦

β is the number of internal bearing walls orthogonal to the façade, and effectively connected to it as to provide
restraining action due to friction
A
2
Tmj ⎡ Tmj j −1 ⎤ ⎛ Lβ ⎞ hs 2 r
⎡L 2 j −1
⎤
Lj + kL + khs tan α j ∑ ( j − i )⎥ + (1 + ∑ ⎜⎜ + μjkhs ⎢ + hs tan α j ∑ ( j − i )⎥
l
⎟ 3 j μsb∑
⎢ ⎟ )
2 ⎣ 2 i =1 ⎦ β ⎝ L ⎠ l =1 r ⎣2 3 i =1 ⎦
λ (0), j =
⎡ LTmj h j −1 ⎤
+ kL s + khs2 tan α j ∑ ( j − i )⎥
2
j⎢ j
⎣ 3 2 3 i =1 ⎦
 as above
L width of facade in between party walls.
Tmj average thickness of wall over height of overturning portion
D
Ti 2
[ ( ) ] ⎡T ⎤
j r j
L var + (ν + η ) hs − hop + βhs j μsb∑ + kLvar ⎢ N + μhs j + ∑ ⋅ (Ti + ΔT + μhs ( j − i ))⎥
1 2 l
∑
i =1 2 3 l =1 r ⎣ 2 = ⎦
λ (0), j =
i 1

⎡ j ⎛ 1⎞ ⎛ j
⎞⎤
hs L var ⎢∑ Ti ⎜ j − i + ⎟ + k ⎜⎜ j + ∑ ( j − i )⎟⎟⎥
⎣ i =1 ⎝ 2 ⎠ ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎦
 as above
 as above = (1,2)
is the number of vertical discontinuities within the façade non coincident with the façade edges
E
 = (1,2)
  integer =(0,1) provides the number of active side connections

Figure 3.65 Possible mechanisms of collapse for simple overturning depending on boundary conditins and connections
between piers and spandrel. (D’Ayala 2003a)

a) b)

Figure 3.66 Overturning of the outer leaf a) (Borri 2004c), b) (Binda 2006a)

59
 Figure 3.67 Separation of wall due to out-of-plane bending.

Vertical out-of-plane bending

A common situation in masonry buildings concerns a wall restrained at the extremity and free in
the central area. This could happen in case of irregular layout of restraints or tie beams (Figure
3.68a, Figure 3.69).
The ties prevent the wall global overturning but other actions or the floor hammering or the
masonry quality could start the vertical instability and the wall bulging (Figure 3.68c,d). The upper
and the lower bonds in general are effective to prevent the global overturning of the wall. The
collapse index is higher then in the unrestrained wal.
In a damaged building, a relevant out of plumb or the wall bulging reveals the mechanism, that
could involve one or more floors.
The mechanism often concerns repaired building by r.c. tie beams not passing thought the wall
section (Figure 3.68c,d). As in previous situation, in multiple leaf masonry the collapse could
involve only the outer leaf (Figure 3.70).
Figure 3.71 summarizes kinematics models for out-of-plane mechanisms involving vertical strips
(Valluzzi 2007).

a) b)

c) d)

Figure 3.68 Vertical out-of-plane bending a) (Borri 2004d), b) (Giuffrè 1993) c) (Doglioni 1999), d) (Binda 2006a)

60
Mechanism Load factor

(Ti + Tk + k ) + Tiν ⎛⎜ TN + Ti hu + khs ⎞⎟ + 2sbhv μ (ν2 − 1) ⎢ ∑ l + (ν − 1)∑ l ⎥

Ti ⎡ r1 r2 ⎤
4 hv ⎝ 2 ⎠ 3lν ⎣l = r0 r1 − r0 l = r1 r − r
1 ⎦
λ(h ) =
2
+
hv (ν − 1) k (ν − 1)
4ν 2
T[
i
− T j
+ ν (Tk
+ T j
) ]
+
ν
h[ v
+ h i
]
− h j

σu
hv 6γ
[Ti 2 + νTk2 + (ν − 1)T j2 ]
+
hv (ν − 1) k (ν − 1)
4ν 2
[Ti − T j + ν (Tk + T j )] +
ν
[hv + hi − h j ]
F r0, r1, r2, number of courses above upper hinge, middle hinge, lower hinge respectively
 real number (0,1)
hv height of portion of wall subjected to mechanism

Kinematism Contribution of friction forces along the sidewalls

Figure 3.69 Development of vertical arch mechanism and load factor calculation (D’Ayala 2003a)

Figure 3.70 Vertical bending and damage of a multiple leaves wall (Borri 1999b)

61
 Figure 3.71 Kinematics models for out-of-plane mechanisms involving vertical strips (Valluzzi 2007)

Horizontal out-of-plane bending - Arch mechanism

Restrained panels to orthogonal walls but not in the upper side could be damaged by bending in
the horizontal plane. Floor or roof beams could thrust the wall but are restrained to the side walls
connection.
The general behaviour involves an arch mechanism within the wall section caused by the out of
plane actions (Figure 3.72). The condition of equilibrium limit is characterised by the developing of
three hinges, one in the middle, the others close to the connection of the lateral walls (Figure
3.72c).
In case of good quality of the lateral masonry and effectiveness of the connections, the collapse
does not happen but the inner side of the wall could be compressed (Figure 3.72b).
The mechanism is typical of walls restrained by ties. The beam hammering or the roof thrust and
the low quality of the masonry could produce the whole mechanism or local damages. More in
detail in multiple leaf masonry, the mechanism could involve only the external leaf that could
collapse (Figure 3.73, Figure 3.74).
Chimney flues, internal masonry discontinuities like holes for rainwater pipes or ducts for other
technical plants reduce the load bearing section, localising the hinges for the kinematic
mechanism. Their mapping should be one of the key point of the building survey addressed to the
seismic structural analysis (Figure 3.75). Furthermore, the opening geometry and position could
affect the behaviour and the extension of the damaged area (Figure 3.75).
In slightly damaged structures the interpretation of the mechanism could be carried out by the
crack pattern survey, which reveals the macro element geometry. In most cases, in undamaged
structures it is difficult to evaluate correctly the probable kinematic mechanism (Figure 3.73, Figure
3.76).
Figure 3.77 summarizes kinematics models for out-of-plane mechanisms involving horizontal strips
(Valluzzi 2007).

62
a) b) c)

Figure 3.72 Arch mechanism a) (Borri 2004c,d)

Figure 3.73 The roof beam hammering can start the kinematic mechanism, as well as the window position

Mechanism Load factor

⎡⎛ Tu + Ti ⋅ kL ⎞ lα (Tu + Ti ) (L − lα ) lβ ⎤
2 r rβ
+ sb(Tu + Ti )∑ + s β bβ lα ∑ ⎥
l
μ ⎢⎜ lα + ⎟ +
⎣⎢⎝ 4 2i ⎠ 2 4 l =1 r ⎥
l β =1 rβ ⎦
λα ,hi =
⎡ (lα + L )(Tu + Ti ) kL ⎤ 5lα + 5 Llα − L
2 2

⎢ + ⎥
⎣ 8 2i ⎦ 3(lα + l )
lα = L − hi 2tgα i ⋅ valid for ( )
2lα lα + L > L2
The index identifies quantities associated with internal bearing walls
G

Kinematism and contribution of internal orthogonal walls to the restraint

Figure 3.74 Development of horizontal arch mechanism and load factor calculation (D’Ayala 2003a)

63
 Figure 3.75 The presence of chimney flues reduces the load bearing section, localising the hinges for the kinematic
mechanism.

Figure 3.76 Arch mechanism due to horizontal bending: layout of the damaged area a) parabolic, b) triangular c)
rectangular (Borri 2004d).

Figure 3.77 From (Valluzzi 2007): kinematics models for out-of-plane mechanisms involving horizontal strips (Bernardini
1988)

Complex overturning mechanism

64
In most cases, the mechanisms are triggered by complex damages. In this case, the overturning of
a wall acts on the orthogonal walls and on the corners, which could be damaged by in plane action
(Figure 3.78-Figure 3.82). The mechanism involves the lack of constraints at the panel top but
effective side connections with the orthogonal walls.
In general, this could happen when wall connections are effective, in contemporary building
portions or in strengthened buildings but with irregular disposal of ties.
The geometry of the damaged area could change with the floor characteristics. Traditional floors
involve the façade overturning and the diagonal cracking of the orthogonal wall. Stiff floors,
instead, produce a double diagonal shape of the cracks in the shear wall.
Many factors affect the mechanism, such as the masonry quality, the openings geometry e
positions in the shear walls, the discontinuity localisation (e.g. chimney flues, plants, etc.).
In case of shear walls without openings the inclination of the diagonal crack increases with the
masonry quality corners (Figure 3.79). The presence of openings close to the wall intersection
affects the geometry and the shape of the damaged area. The collapse index decreases with the
decreasing of the area of the shear walls involved in the mechanism, up to the value of the simple
overturning of the façade.
The macroelement geometry derives from several factors and could involve many building floor, in
relation to the presence of ties or other constraints. The mechanism frequently affects good quality
masonry. Contemporary shear damages of the perpendicular walls – the restraining walls - could
start the mechanism during the earthquake (Figure 3.80, Figure 3.82).
The mechanism is the frequent cause of the corner damages, particularly if coupled with roof
thrust. Furthermore ground movements or simply the lack of constraint at the base of buildings in
slope can increase the overturning movement. Figure 2.27 and Figure 3.83 show example of the
overturning mechanism in buildings in slope.

Figure 3.78 Overturning of the façade with damage of the orthogonal wall (Borri 2004c)

Figure 3.79 The overturning of the façade in case of effective connection damages the orthogonal walls with a variable
angle with the masonry quality (Borri 2004c): a) good quality masonry (angle 30° and 45°), b) average quality (15° and
30°); c) low quality (0° and 15°)

65
 a) b)

Figure 3.80 Mixed overturning mechanisms a) (Avorio 2002a) b) (Doglioni 1999)

Mechanism Load factor

j
Ti2 ⎛h ⎞ ⎡T j ⎤
∑ ∑ ⋅ (T+ ΔT + μhs ( j − i ))⎥
h
L + (ε + β ) s j 2 tan α j Ts ⎜⎜ s tan α j + Ti ⎟⎟ + kL ⎢ N + μhs j + i
i =1
2 2 ⎝ 3 ⎠ ⎢⎣ 2 i =1 ⎥⎦
λ (0), j =
⎡ j ⎛ 1⎞ h2 ⎛ j ⎞⎤
hs ⎢∑
⎢ i =1
LTi ⎜ j − i + ⎟ + (ε + β ) s j 3 tan α j + kL⎜ j +
⎝ 2⎠ 3 ⎜ ∑
( j − i )⎟⎥
⎟⎥
⎣ ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎦
is the number of edge party walls orthogonal to the façade under exam which can provide
restraining
action  
B1  as above
Ts thickness of party walls and internal bearing walls
j
Ti2 ⎛h ⎞ ⎡T j ⎤
∑ ∑ ⋅ (T + ΔT + μhs ( j − i ))⎥
h
L + (ε + β ) s j 2 tan α j Ts ⎜⎜ s tan α j + Ti ⎟⎟ + kL ⎢ N + μhs j + i
i =1
2 2 ⎝ 3 ⎠ ⎣⎢ 2 i =1 ⎦⎥
λ (0), j =
⎡ j ⎛ 1⎞ h2 ⎛ j ⎞⎤
∑
hs ⎢ LTi ⎜ j − i + ⎟ + (ε + β ) s j 3 tan α j + kL⎜ j +
⎢ i =1 ⎜ ∑ ( j − i )⎟⎟⎥
⎣ ⎝ 2⎠ 3 ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎥⎦
 as above
 as above
B2
2 2
⎡ TN + T j j 2 ⎤ ⎞ ⎛Tj ⎞ ⎡ TN + T j j 2 ⎤ ⎞ ⎛Tj ⎞
2 2
j −1
⎛ jhh j −1
⎛ jhh
θ jf ⎢ + νk ∑ ( j − i )⎥ ⎜⎜ θ jf ⎟⎟ + ⎜⎜ ⎟⎟ + θ js ⎢ + νk ∑ ( j − i )⎥ ⎜⎜ θ js ⎟⎟ + ⎜⎜ ⎟⎟
⎣ 2 2 i =0 ⎦ ⎝ 3 ⎠ ⎝ 2⎠ ⎣ 2 2 i =0 ⎦ ⎝ 3 ⎠ ⎝ 2⎠
λ (0), j =
2 ⎡ 2 T N + T j hs − ⎤
( ) ( )
j 1
j⎢ j θ jf + θ js + k νθ jf + (1 − ν )θ js ∑ ( j − i )⎥
3 ⎣ 2 2 i =0 ⎦

jf =tan jf
C
js =tan js

integer identifies the load bearing wall =(0,1)

Figure 3.81 Development of overturning mechanisms for coupled walls and load factor calculation (D’Ayala 2003a)

Figure 3.82 Mixed overturning mechanisms

66
a) b)

Figure 3.83 The slope can worse the wall overturning a) (Borri 2004c) b) (Carocci 2001)

3.1.2.1.1 Adobe Structures

At a global level, the failure of adobe is so described in (Vargas Neumann 2006):
1. Significant cracking starts in regions subjected to tension
2. Out of plane rocking causes large vertical cracking that separate walls
3. Walls overturn
4. Walls break into separate pieces, which may collapse independently
Seismic damage to adobe buildings (Tolles 1996) is not limited to the typical damages observed in
other masonry (in-plane X-cracking, out-of-plane gable wall failure, out-of-plane collapse of wall
subjected to high confining forces). It also includes, assumingly at lower stress than for fired brick
masonry, the damage typologies shown in Figure 3.84.

Out-of-plane flexure in load bearing walls

This type of damage to earthen buildings was
reported, in the case of load bearing walls, to
mainly result in cracking, leaving walls stable.

Slippage between walls and wood framing

Roof, ceiling, and floor framing often slips at the
interface with the adobe walls due to inadequate
connection to the adobe walls.
Horizontal upper-wall cracks: horizontal cracks
may develop near the tops of walls when there
is a bond beam or the roof is anchored to the
beam.
Moisture damage contributions to instability
Out-of-plane instability (or a contribution to
instability) is caused by weakening or erosion,
usually at the base, or saturation or
repeated wet/dry cycles resulting in
weakened slip-planes at the base of the wall
along which the wall can slip and collapse.
Corner damage
Damage often occurs at the comers of buildings
due to the stress concentrations that
occur at the intersection of perpendicular walls.
Instability of comer sections often
occurs because two sides of the comer are
unrestrained. Therefore, the comer section
is free to collapse outward from the building.
Vault/Dome damage
From photographic documentation, seems
attributable to failure of side walls
Figure 3.84 Damage Typology for Adobe Buildings

67
An attempt to define collapse mechanisms was made by Kiyono and Kalantari (Kiyono 2004), who
attributed the catastrophic collapse of Bam (Iran) to “improper” bonding strength of mortar.
The collapse mechanisms proposed are three:
1) Overturning of wall (monolithic) – as per Section entitled “Simple Overturning”
2) Slippage
3) Failure of bond between bricks, proposed in (Kiyono 2004), Figure 3.85.

Kα: overturning moment caused by seismic force

n : no. of bricks
W : Weight of each brick
p : bonding strength in the normal direction
A : Area of bond

Figure 3.85 Collapse mechanism proposed in (Kiyono 2004)

An important parameter concerning overturning is the wall slenderness (height-to-thickness ratio),

on the basis of which Ginell et al. (Ginell 1995) categorised the seismic performance of adobe
walls.
Similar evaluation could be done for rammed earth buildings (Figure 3.86) and cob buildings
(Figure 3.87).

Figure 3.86 Damage Typology for Rammed Earth Buildings

Figure 3.87 Damage Typology for Cob Buildings

3.1.2.2 Pillars
Slender structural elements like pillars and columns frequently show overturning damages caused
by out of plane bending. Beside the overall overturning, seismic action could produce the drum
shifting (Figure 3.88) in stone columns.
Bending action during earthquakes could act at the base of slender structures producing local
stress concentration (Figure 3.89, Figure 3.90)

68
The coupling of stress concentration due to the seismic bending with high compression stress
could increase or start the damage due to long term behaviour. It has been shown that the
behaviour of masonry under the action of persistent loads can evolve over a relatively long time to
its collapse (Binda 1992). This can happen under lower stress values than those corresponding to
the nominal material strength subjected to standard monotonic compression tests. The creep
phenomenon can start at 45-50 % of the nominal strength value in some soft stones like
limestones.
Several case histories show that significant crack patterns, clearly due to vertical compression
caused mainly by the dead load, often appear on the walls of ancient towers as well as on
particularly slender or heavily loaded elements like columns, pillars, etc., which turn out to be
overloaded by heavy persistent compressive stresses (Binda 2008b). Furthermore, this happens
any time significant concentrations of stresses take place in some portions of the material due to
non-uniform stress distributions. The available experimental data collected to date tends to show
an evident increase of lateral deformations developed in time caused by the development of the
typical vertical cracks due to compressive stresses. The dilation phenomenon, an apparent
increase in volume, can lead to collapse due to crack propagation. The effect can also be coupled
with synergetic stresses caused by cyclic wind action and temperature variation. Additional minor
shocks, like storms, low intensity earthquakes, etc., may contribute to increase the damage. The
damage can easily develop when the material used for the construction is rather weak (weak
bricks and mortars with irregular joints, soft stones) or the technique of construction is such that the
internal core of the masonry can settle and deform more than the external leaf. In all these cases
the damage can start early, even a few years after the construction, or after some partial
reconstruction or even repair, and continue very slowly for decades, until a sudden collapse
happens.

a) b) c) d)

Figure 3.88 a) Cathedral of Syracuse: drum shifted after an earthquake in XVI th cent. (Binda 2007c) and (Giuffrè 1993);
b), block shift as reported by Azevedo and Guerreiro in (Sousa Oliveira 2008) (c) rocking and overturning of columns

Figure 3.89 Local damage concentration due to bending action during earthquakes (Binda 2010)

69
 Figure 3.90 A damaged pillar in the courtyard of the Spanish fortress in L’Aquila

3.2 ARCHES / VAULTS / DOMES

3.2.1 Introduction
Among the structural components in masonry buildings, arches and vaults deserve particular
attention for being widespread in European historical centres but also outside Europe e.g. in
Middle East; therefore, their preservation as part of the cultural heritage is a topical subject.
Along the times, the building technology evolved taking into accounts the local environment,
problems and materials. The case of the Roman and Byzantine domes could be cited, made by
light clay elements as pipes and diffused also in area with soil settlements like Ravenna. Vaults
and domes have been used extensively in the roofing of ancient buildings, often with large span in
the case of the Churches or Mosques (Figure 3.91-Figure 3.93). Knowledge of the behaviour of
these structural elements under load is fundamental for the safety evaluation of most buildings and
to plan structurally compatible and economic conservation programmes (Theodossopoulos 2004).

ARCHES
BRICK ARCHES

REGULAR STONE ARCHES

UNREGULAR STONE ARCHES

Figure 3.91 Examples of arch typologies (Binda 2003b)

70
These structures can suffer several types of damage, due to many causes (such as earthquakes,
age, etc.). Soil movements and deformations can disturb the equilibrium and cause instability. In
practice, the pattern of failure can be established through in-situ observations. A careful
examination of the changes in the geometry induced by progressive failure of the supporting
system is essential for the early diagnosis and accurate treatment of the problem. This requires a
deep knowledge of the behaviour and characteristic of each arch, vault or domes typology.
Furthermore, the correct structural evaluation and the modelling should also take into account the
influence of some traditional reinforcement or building characteristics, like metal ties or infilled
rubble materials at the extrados (Theodossopoulos 2004). Hence, the contribution of strengthening
materials and repair techniques is often required to re-establish or enhance their performances and
to prevent a brittle collapse of the masonry in possible future hazardous conditions.
Many factors affect their structural behaviour, such as geometry, stiffness and mass distribution,
building evolution, damage and repair interventions.

VAULTS

BARREL VAULT GROINED VAULT RIBBED VAULT

PENDENTIVE COMPOSED
CLOISTER VAULT FAN VAULT
VAULT VAULT

Figure 3.92 Examples of vault typologies (Binda 2003b)

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 DOMES
SOLID MASONRY LIGHTENED ROMAN CONCRETE

HEMISPHERICAL
SAUCER DOME RIBBED DOME
(CALOTTES)

Figure 3.93 Examples of dome typologies (Binda 2003b)

3.2.2 Typologies
There are different structural typologies of vaults from ancient times to today. Arches and vaults
can be classified by the typology of structure (e.g. barrel vault, cross vault, pavilion vault, fan vault,
etc) and depending on the pattern used for laying bricks (e.g. stretcher bond, Flemish bond,
herringbone pattern, etc).
The most common typologies of vaults are the barrel and cross vaults; the former, in particular, has
been object of the scientific community’s interest because, together with the semicircular arch,
from which it derives, it is the most elementary shape of spanning curve structure and, as such, it
well reflects the average performance and the typical pathologies of the whole class of horizontal
curve structures.
The vaulted structures can be typologically divided, according to its geometry, which is one of its
most important parameters, essential to determine the proper structural behaviour. According to
(Carbonara 2004) the vaults can be typologically classified as (Figure 3.94-Figure 3.95):
i. Translation Vaults, generated by the movement of a straight line (generatrix) along a curve
(Figure 3.94);
a. Barrel vault
b. Groin vault
c. Barrel vault (with or without) lunettes
d. Cloister vault
e. Volta a schifo (composed vaults)
ii. Rotations Vaults, defined the rotation of a curve around an axis (Figure 3.95).
a. Ribbed vault;
b. Dome;
c. Circular barrel vault.

72
 (a) (b) (c)

(d) (e)

Figure 3.94 Translation vaults. (a) Barrel vault, (Carbonara 2004). (b) Groin vault, (Carbonara 2004). (c) Barrel vaults
with lunettes, (Isawi 2001). (d) Cloister vault, (Isawi 2001). (e) Volta a schifo, composed vault (Isawi 2001).

(a) (b)

(c)

Figure 3.95 Rotation vaults. (a) Ribbed vault, (Isawi 2001). (b) Dome, (Isawi 2001). (c) Circular barrel vault, (Carbonara
2004).

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3.2.2.1 Structural behaviour
From the Roman age to the Renaissance, the problem of stability and correct design of arches
were mainly faced under a geometrical point of view (Figure 3.96), even though the presence of
horizontal thrusts was already perceived at least in the 1st century B.C., as reported by Vitruvius
within De Architectura, (Benvenuto 1981). Wide reviews of the historical progress of studies on
masonry arches and vaults can be found in (Benvenuto 1981), (Heyman 1982), (Boothby 2001)
(Carbone 2001), (Theodossopoulos 2004).
An intact masonry arch is statically indeterminate. It becomes determinate when three hinges form
in the arch ring under live load.
The thrust action transmitted by arches and vaults to walls and piers is usually the only cause of
damage to the supporting walls or piers or the vaults and arches themselves. If the thrust is too
high, it might cause out of plumb, overturning and deformation of the supporting structure.
Heyman (1995) observes that a structure must satisfy three main structural criteria: strength,
stiffness and stability. Moreover, three standard assumptions can be made when dealing with
historic masonry structures:
• Masonry has no tensile strength as mortar is weak or lacking;
• Stresses are so low that masonry has effectively an unlimited compressive strength;
• Sliding failure does not occur.
Thus, failure of masonry in compression is unlikely to affect the whole structure, despite local
cracking and spalling, and deflections are negligible, because of the stiffness of masonry. Hence,
instability is the cause of failure in a masonry structure.
For a voussoir arch, instability involves the formation of hinges that allow the creation of a
mechanism. It is common to observe cracks in specific locations on a vault; however, as long as
there are only three hinges, the structure is statically determined and no further displacement
occurs. Conversely when four hinges form, due to movements in the supports or change of load
bearing on the vaults, the vault will be subject to the creation of a kinematic mechanism and will
hence collapse (Figure 3.97).

Figure 3.96 Geometrical design rule still used during the 18th century, (Benvenuto 1981).

Figure 3.97 Voussoir arch: stable state of cracked arch (left) and collapse under point load (right) (Heyman, 1995)

74
The formation of three hinges is inevitable: the structure naturally tends to accommodate the small
displacements in the abutments due to differential settlements or the shrinking and wear and tear
of mortar. On the one hand the formation of a three-pin arch in fact imply that one of the infinite
number of balance positions of the structures has been determined by external conditions, so that
the line of thrust can be calculated.
On the other hand, the creation of an unstable mechanism means that a change of loading or an
imposed displacement occurred and a seismic event can cause either or both these effects.
In structural analysis, four hinge positions are selected to search for the minimum collapse load
taking into account all forces acting whilst still fully containing the thrust line within the arch ring. In
fact, four hinges are needed to allow a kinematic mechanism (Figure 3.97-Figure 3.98), and then
the rotation of the supporting elements (pillars, masonry walls, columns, etc.).
In general the mechanisms could be due to asymmetric or excessive vertical loads, or to a relative
displacement of the abutments, as it happens in case of earthquake.
The vaults structural mechanism (similar to the arches) takes advantage of the natural crushing of
the elements that composes it, provided that two basic conditions that ensure the equilibrium are
guaranteed:
i. Vaults stability: a generic anti-funicular that balances the loads must be within the profile on
every section causing a compression stress state compatible with the composing materials;
eccentric compression would lead to unsustainable masonry bending (due to its almost
absent tensile strength);
ii. Global stability: the piers on which the vault is supported should be able to accommodate
the horizontal thrust generated by it.
These conditions, essential for the stability of the element, are the two principles that guide the
design of a vaulted structure that function well, and in case of an existing building, that allow
assessing the structural safety.
The "pushing" that characterizes these structures, makes them intrinsically prone to
instability/damage, propensity that can be enhanced by any seismic phenomena.

Figure 3.98 Damage mechanisms of arches (Rondelet 1834)

3.2.2.2 Damage mechanisms and their causes

It is possible to classify the vaults collapse mechanisms based on its causes. Among the possible
sources of damage it is possible to distinguish:
i. The relative displacement of the supports;
a. Displacement of the supports on the orthogonal direction to the generatrix line of the
vaults;
b. Differential settlement of the piers;

75
 c. Longitudinal sliding.
ii. The variation of the load to which the vaults and piers are subjected;
iii. The decay of masonry.
The first mode mechanisms involve the rotation of the supporting elements (walls, columns, pillars,
etc.) (Figure 3.99, Figure 3.100, Figure 3.101, Figure 3.102), while the second mode mechanisms
involve in plane loading, then a relative sliding and deformation due to shear stresses (Figure
3.99).
The masonry texture plays a key role in the structural system, being base on equilibrium of mutual
thrust of the blocks. Other example could be the texture of barrel vaults, discriminating the
behaviour as 3D shell or set of adjacent arches (Cattari 2008). Texture influences the crack
pattern, affecting potential sliding planes. Other factors are the presence of infilling, structural
backing and constraint boundary conditions, deriving by building traditions or damages. Tie-rod
insertion in church macro-elements is very common, but their effectiveness is related (in addition to
the quality of the anchorages) to internal prestress and position (e.g., at the arch haunches or
lower) (Figure 3.101, Figure 3.102).
Lunettes in barrel vaults are often built without connection to lateral walls: in this condition when
the vault and the supporting walls perform out-of-phase oscillations, they can act as struts or
counterforts if compressed and without damage if the wall tends to rotate (Cattari 2008).

Figure 3.99 I and II mechanisms in vaults and strengthening intervention. From (Giovanetti 1998)

76
 Figure 3.100 Vault with extrados infilling damaged by the supporting wall movement (Doglioni 2007)

In single-nave churches, the structural macro-elements made by the arch-pillar system (dividing
one bay from others) or the triumphal arch (separating the nave from the presbyterial area) are
often present: typically, the seismic damage is represented by a four-hinge mechanism. It may
involve both the arch pillars, or only the one subjected to an outward thrust. Sometimes the pillars
of the triumphal arch work as shear walls, as they are generally quite wide because of the minor
width of the presbytery. This macroelement is characterized by in-plane seismic response in spite
of its slight stiffness out of plane; the presence of the church hall and of the presbytery and/or apse
prevents the activation of an out-of-plane collapse mechanism. In Figure 3.102, typical collapse
mechanisms of the triumphal arch structure in a church are described.
Effects of excessive thrust values that can cause damage to arches and vaults are shown in Figure
3.103.

Figure 3.101 Damage mechanism for unreinfornced and tied arches (Avorio 2002a)

77
 Figure 3.102 From (Lagomarsino 2009b). Three-block kinematic chain for the triumphal arch in the churches: (a)
mechanism A-two-pillar overturning mechanism; (b) mechanism B-one-pillar overturning mechanism;

Figure 3.103 Frequent damage mechanism on barrel vaults, cloister vaults and domes (Croci 2001)

The survey templates of Figure 2.2 illustrate with drawings illustrating the most important crack
pattern after earthquakes in churches, including damage on vaults and domes (PCM 2001).
Although the seismic behaviour of masonry structures has been extensively studied
experimentally, analytically and numerically, still little is known about the structural performance of
vaulted structures undergoing earthquake actions. It is certainly clear from the survey of damaged
vaulted structures that seismic action induces bending in the vault ring as well as rocking of the
abutments at the base.
The onset of failure mechanisms and their evolution in the large-displacement field was
investigated via the principle of virtual works in order to define capacity curves (Abruzzese 1999),
(Housner, 1963), (Lagomarsino 2004b) and out-of-phase rocking of the abutments (Como 1991).
Giuriani et al. (Giuriani 2007) proposed instead a simplified analytical method, relying on limit
analysis, for the assessment of the seismic vulnerability of transverse arches undergoing rocking of
the abutments. The study highlighted how in at-rest conditions, the arch lateral thrust can be
largely, or entirely, resisted by the buttress action of the abutments, whereas the arch thrust is
increased by the rocking mechanism, which is also responsible for the drop in the confining action
of the buttress. This implies that strengthening ties must be not only dimensioned to resist the
thrust exceeding the abutments capacity in at-rest conditions, but need indeed to provide an
adequate response to the whole arch thrust during seismic events (Giuriani 1993, 1995, 2007).
Such result was also achieved by Lagomarsino et al. (Lagomarsino 2004b) by application of the
principle of virtual works.
The rocking excitation that barrel vaults experience under horizontal load was experimentally
investigated by Marini et al. (Marini 2008) through full scale cyclic testing of a masonry arch
representing a unitary-length slice of a barrel wall confined at the arch springing by an intrados
78
metallic tie. The structure proved to be relatively ductile in terms of displacements, even though
little energy dissipation was achieved and the behaviour was highly self-centring. Failure was
reached by formation of four hinges at the crown of the arch and in the abutments. The tension
measured in the tie significantly changed due to the loss of the buttressing action of the abutments
and the increase of the arch span. Results were validated by FE modelling: the locations of the
cracks resulted to be function of the geometry and applied vertical loads.
The intersection of two equal semicilindrical barrels generates the simplest form of groin vault; the
resulting bay of vaulting is square in plan, and the diagonals of the square define the location of the
groins (Heyman, 1995). Because of difficulties in cutting the stones meeting at the groins,
especially when the two intersecting barrels had different length and height, Romanesque builders
started the construction of vaults by first erecting the masonry arches along the diagonals, which
were then embedded, either fully or partially, within the masonry of the vault webs. Later on the
use of ribs became common: the ribs had aesthetic functions – they helped concealing the joints at
the groins – as well as structural features: the discontinuity due to the intersection of the two
curved surfaces of the barrels indeed causes a localised increase of stresses and requires
reinforcement. However, it’s not infrequent that ribs are purely decorative; this can be observed
where no variation of the curvature is present at the groins, meaning that the vault doesn’t present
localised stresses in such position.
In quadripartite vaults, three different typologies of cracks can be observed (Figure 3.106): 1)
cracks in the main barrel of the vault in the region of the crown, which correspond to plastic hinges
at the extrados of the vault, 2) fissures the Sabouret and 3) cracks separating the vault webs from
the bearing walls.
Sabouret cracks open because of a movement in the supporting walls: the vault cannot completely
accommodate such displacements and the formation of the three hinges provokes the separation
of the masonry of the vault from the walls. Such phenomenon also involves the masonry of the
buttresses with appearance of the cracks of the third type.
As said above, several typologies of vaults are present in historic structures, even if some are
frequently neglected, like fan and pavilion vaults, because of the intrinsic difficulty of applying
simplified theories to their complex shapes.
D’Ayala and Tomasoni (D’Ayala 2008) investigated in detail the behaviour of pavilion vaults by
computational models and, by the use of the concept of thrust surface, overcame some of the
limitations typical of the analysis of masonry vaults. One major simplification that is normally
carried out for the study of vaults is indeed the reduction of the three-dimensional structure to a
series of adjacent arches, without transversal connection nor the mutual interaction between the
‘slices’. For such hypothesis the results, in spite of being conservative for uniform load distribution,
are limited to specific loading conditions and are not exhaustive in respect to the assessment of the
global behaviour of the vault.
The authors’ analytical method, which account instead for finite friction and is based on a lower
bound approach, allows obtaining the crack pattern, the stress field and horizontal thrust at the
supports of the pavilion vaults considering the three-dimensional behaviour of the vault (Figure
3.104-Figure 3.105).

Figure 3.104 Horizontal trust along the supports obtained by the simplified arch model (a) and the actual horizontal
thrust obtained by the limit state analysis (b) (D’Ayala 2008)

79
 Figure 3.105 Possible collapse mechanism of vault for each slice (D’Ayala 2008)

Analytical results demonstrate that even vaults with rigid boundary conditions at the support are
affected by cracks along the diagonals, unlike the common opinion that ascribes the diagonal
cracks to the walls overturning. Furthermore, the vault web, despite diagonal cracks, develops a
series of natural arches that define an alternative load path from the centre of the web to the
diagonals, allowing for the transmission of load between adjacent arches.

Figure 3.106 Crack patterns of quadripartite cross vault as described in (Heyman 1995)

Plastic hinges may form at the intrados towards the springs of the vault and at the extrados in the
crown area; moreover, the vault could fail by sliding. This latter failure mode is not included in the
traditional approach, which considers friction infinite and sliding impossible, whereas in the reality
sliding can be observed because of the deterioration of the binding materials or contact surfaces.
The structural behaviour of pavilion masonry vaults can vary with the rise-span ratio: in shallow
vaults the geometry is closer to the thrust surface generated by the gravity load distribution and
compression hoop stresses are present for a larger portion of the surface, meaning that the spread
of cracks that develop along the diagonal and in the centre of the web depends on the vault rise.
The horizontal thrust also increase if the vault rise reduces and the trend along the perimeter walls
tend to become constant for shallower vaults. Therefore reducing the rise/span ratio, the natural
arches that develop in the pavilion vaults and that causes the transfer of meridian stresses from
the centre of the web to the diagonal aft a smaller area near the diagonal itself.
Barringer (2006) gives a relevant contribution to the topic of the structural behaviour of vaults by
investigating the performance of herringbone vaults, which are almost completely missing from the
literature. The herringbone pattern is formed by a zigzag pattern consisting of columns of short
parallel lines, with all the lines in one column sloping one way and all the lines in the next column
sloping the other way (Oxford English Dictionary).
This method of laying bricks has many names including Fish Backbone (Spinapesce) and opus
spicatum; the latter name comes from the Roman period and described the way in which bricks

80
could be laid, although the pattern was used to decorative purposes rather than with structural
functions.
There is also evidence that the pattern was popularly used by the Vikings during the 8th ad 11th
Centuries. According to the Viking Heritage Magazine (VHM 2002) the pattern derived from the
carpenter’s efforts to hew the timber always in the same direction, which achieved a smooth and
water repellent finish. Furthermore the pattern was used in the U.K. during the 16th century as infill
for timber frame houses. This was a replacement for wattle and daub, and although it was cheaper
due to the lower labour’s skill required to lay bricks, it created draughtier buildings due to the gaps
left when put against timber.
However the Herringbone pattern had a widest use for the construction of vaults and domes
around the world, and especially in Italy. One of the most famous examples is the Cupola of Santa
Maria del Fiore by Brunelleschi.
Barringer (Barringer 2006) simulates a herringbone semicircular vault undergoing different vertical
loads by a three-dimensional FE model, where material behaviour is defined by the Drucker-Prager
relationship. The herringbone pattern seems to be more efficient than a voussoir arch since it
allows for a better distribution of stresses and displacements. However the author doesn’t provide
direct comparison with a model of a voussoir arch nor analyses the performance for horizontal
loads.
3.2.2.2.1 Adobe domes
A research carried out at Politecnico of Milan concerning Arg-e-Bam (Iran) (Licciardi 2008), heavy
damaged by an earthquake in 2003, catalogued recursive damages in domes, both ancient
structures and repaired/rebuilt structures. The typical adobe domes of this area are frequently built
without wood scaffolding.
There are a lot of version of this typology, but they can be grouped in four main types:
i. Domes with concentric courses;
ii. Domes with jointed pendentives (first type);
iii. Domes with jointed pendentives (second type);
iv. Domes with isolated pendentives.
The first typology are the rotation domes, the most simple structures, hemispherical, with the bricks
arranged radially (Figure 3.107) and jointed by a clay-gypsum mortar (60% of clay, 30% of fine
sand and 10% of gypsum as quick setting). These dome are locally called colombu’ and their
structural behaviour is very effective.

Figure 3.107 Scheme of the layout of the brick courses of the first typology dome recognised at Arg-e-Bam (Licciardi
2008).

These domes have squared base, and they are supported by hemispheric or hemispheroidal
pendentives (Figure 3.108).
This typology showed the better seismic behaviour during the Bam earthquake. In fact few cracks
were observed after the earthquake, usually localised in the mortar joints, therefore set
concentrically, or seldom, oblique. Few domes collapsed and most damages were probably

81
caused by the collapse of the supporting pillars or walls rather then to the structural ineffectiveness
of the dome itself (Figure 3.109).

a) b)

Figure 3.108 a) Barracks, Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Hemispherical dome built on pendentives with concentric brick courses -
April 2006 (Licciardi 2008) b) Bazaar, Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Restoration and rebuilding of the central dome by the technique
of concentric courses and plastered arches - before the earthquake of 2003 (Source: Iranian Cultural Heritage and
Tourism Organisation, Teheran).

Figure 3.109 Scheme of the courses layout and of the typical crack pattern surveyed on domes of the first typology (Arg-
e-Bam) (Licciardi 2008).

The second dome typology includes the domes with pendentives, which are locally called
colombu’-e-gushvar. The single pendentives are laid on the median axes of the open sides and the
bricks are arranged in inclined arched courses (Figure 3.110). Furthermore, each course lies on
truncated cones, the section has not constant height and the key stone line does not follow a linear
directrix, but an arc of a circle (Figure 3.111).

Figure 3.110 Scheme of the courses disposal in a dome of the second group (Arg-e-Bam) (Licciardi 2008)..

82
 Figure 3.111 Complex of Mirza Na’im, Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Restoration and rebuilding of a dome of the second group
before the 2003 earthquake (Source: Iranian Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization, Teheran).

This dome typology is very diffused at Arg-e-Bam, also thank to the decorative effect of the joint
layout. Unfortunately it showed an ineffective structural behaviour, since the four segments of the
dome are badly jointed to each other and the brick courses intersect each other at right angle at
the median axes, causing local weakness and, then, possible damage concentration. In case of
earthquake the cracks are concentrated where in the courses line changes and, in highly damaged
cases, along the diagonals as well (Figure 3.112).

Figure 3.112 Scheme of the courses layout and of the typical crack pattern surveyed on domes of the second group
(Arg-e-Bam) (Licciardi 2008).

In serious cases the whole structure collapsed except the impost of the pendentive, connected to
the supporting walls. In the previous typology the damage was often due to the collapse of the
supporting elements, pillars or walls; this typology instead is generally supported by continuous
walls and their collapse is mainly related to the building technique which involves local vulnerability
caused by the courses discontinuity. Similar to the previous case, the course bond is very poor as
well as the general brick layout is not effective with joint alignments (Figure 3.113).

83
 Figure 3.113 Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Dome of the second typology with pendentives. In case of nearly complete collapse the
poor masonry configuration is clear - April 2006 (Licciardi 2008).

It is also important to point out some interesting use of this dome typology. Since they are built as a
half dome, they are often used together with other vault typologies, local called zarbi, in order to
build a conch, supporting the vault in absence of a wall (Figure 3.114). These domes are also used
to build jutting out conches, which are placed to protect porches. In these cases their use allowed
to cover rectangular spaces and to have an arched fronts, creating refined decorations (Figure
3.115).

Figure 3.114 Bazaar, Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Restoration and partial rebuilding of a conch to close a zarbi vault, by a dome of
the second typology called colombu’- e- gushvar (Source: Iranian Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization,
Teheran).

84
 Figure 3.115 Complex of Mirza Na’im, Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Use of a dome of the second typology called colombu’- e-
gushvar, to cover a rectangular porch - April 2006 (Licciardi 2008).

The third group of domes includes domes with pendentives laid down parallel to the supporting
walls (Figure 3.116). The bricks are jointed by earth mortars and gypsum and they are arranged in
inclined arched courses, laid on conic surfaces; the orientation of the laying cones (Figure 3.117) is
opposite in comparison with the previous case; however the vulnerability factors are the same.

Figure 3.116 Scheme of the layout of the bricks courses in a dome of the third group (Arg-e-Bam) (Licciardi 2008).

Figure 3.117 Arg-e-Bam, Iran. Layout of the bricks courses of a dome of the third typology (Source: Iranian Cultural
Heritage and Tourism Organization, Teheran).

In fact, the damage localisation is similar to the one of the domes of the second type, with cracks
along the diagonals, close to the pendentives joints, where the bricks courses change the
alignment angle. In the most damaged cases cracks along the median axes but also parallel to the
supporting walls are visible (Figure 3.118).

85
 Figure 3.118 Scheme of the course layout and of the typical crack patterns surveyed on a dome of the third group
present at Arg-e-Bam. (Licciardi 2008).

The last typology is composed by domes with isolated pendentives locally called colombu’-e-
chahar tac. They are a combination of the second and third type, with arched course following a
trend similar to that of the colombu’- e- gushvar (second dome typology) and with a sharp change
of the course alignment along the diagonals, like in the third type of domes (Figure 3.119).

Figure 3.119 Scheme of the brick courses layout in a dome of the fourth group (Arg-e-Bam) (Licciardi 2008).

In this case, much more than in the previous, the pendentives are isolated and they show two
discontinuities. The first is the same of the previous two typologies and related to the courses
discontinuity close to the diagonals. The second is along the medians of the vault, where the
pendentives are completely isolated to each other due to the joint alignment in this position, even if
they have parallel brick courses. This building solution is apparently incomprehensible and it is
difficult to find a clear explanation. For the previous reasons this group has the highest intrinsic
weakness. The first cracks are concentrated along the medians, as a result of ineffectiveness of
the joint connections. In the most damaged cases cracks along the diagonals and parallel to the
median axes are documented (Figure 3.120).

Figure 3.120 Scheme of the courses layout typical of a dome of the fourth typology present at Arg-e-Bam (Licciardi
2008).

Lightened domes are often used to cover large span structures, as in the stalls of the citadel Arg-e-
Bam. They are built following the technique of the first, second and third dome typologies in order
to have wide spaces. For example, in a case of the stalls at Arg-e-Bam, the domes create a
86
complex covering structure; they are supported by pillars and allow to reinforce a larger dome at
the impost, without over load the vertical elements. At the same time, this allows to have the ceiling
at a constant height (Figure 3.121).
In these cases heavy damages were observed, often collapses, due to the peculiar weakness of
the structural solution with the dome intersecting other domes above the pillars.

Figure 3.121 The lightened domes of the stalls at Arg-e-Bam, Iran – April 2006 (Licciardi 2008).

3.2.2.3 Types of interventions

Next is presented a brief overview of the traditionally used types of consolidation according to
(Giardina 2006) (Figure 3.122).

a) Buttress;
b) Counter vaults in reinforced concrete;
c) Counter vault in lime mortar and FRP net;
d) Transversal vertical diaphragms, (frenelli);
e) Tie at the intrados;
f) Tie at the extrados;
g) Vertical tie;
h) Curve tie;
i) Suspension tie;
j) Cross ties at the extrados;
k) Overcoat with composite material strips.
l) Reinforcement arches.

Figure 3.122 Traditional arch reinforcements (Croci 2001)

3.3 FLOORS
Traditional floors are usually built in timber loaded directly on the walls. Since the end of XIX
century iron/steel beams with fired clay elements or small shallow barrel vaults had been diffused.

87
During the earthquakes the beams could hammer directly on the walls, thrusting the whole panel or
only one leaf.
Structurally a floor has to:
• support the vertical loads without collapsing and without excessive deformation, (the criteria
of out-of-plane strength and stiffness);
• have adequate in-plane stiffness in order to distribute the loads to the vertical structures;
• ensure an effective connection to the perimetrical vertical structures in order to ensure box
type behaviour of the entire building.

3.3.1 Wooden floor typologies

In terms of typology, on a wooden floor it is possible to distinguish two main parts, with different
structure and function, the supporting structure and the planking, (Angotti 2005):
The supporting structure consists of one or more frames, arranged in directions orthogonal to each
other (usually, a main frame composed by beams and a secondary frame composed by joists). The
frame has a static function of resisting vertical actions due to its self-weight, the weight of the deck
elements, the weight of the completing parts at the intrados and extrados, and also of any existent
partitions and variable live loads.
The deck is, in its simplest configuration, composed by a plane element made with one or more
layers of wooden boards joined adjacently to each others, Figure 3.123a), or made by tiles,
supported by the beams, (Figure 3.123b). The deck has a static function of resisting vertical loads
applied directly on it and to distribute them between the supporting frame elements, and also, of
assigning transversal stiffness to the frame, in order to transfer the horizontal loads to the structure
vertical elements.
The wooden floors can be divided according to the arrangement of the supporting beams and to
the material that is placed above the beams, boards or panels.

(a) (b)

Figure 3.123 Types of wooden floors: (a) deck with wooden boards; (b) deck with tile flooring, (Angotti 2005).

In what concerns residential buildings under service loads, the wooden floors can be divided into
two main categories:
i. With the main bearing frame equal to the length of the span to be covered;
ii. With the main bearing frame with a length inferior to the span that needs to be covered.
To the first group belong the simple frame floors and the composed frame floors. While the second
group includes: Serlio type floors, compartmented floors, polygonal floors, ray floors and all the
floors that have a bearing frame composed by non-parallel beams, crossed in different directions
and between them.
Apart from these types of wooden floors it will also be presented next, in more detail, the new
generation wooden floors.

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3.3.1.1 With the main bearing frame equal to the length of the span to be covered
Simple unidirectional floors

This type of floor is the most common in historical constructions in Italy. The main beams are
arranged according to one direction, Figure 3.124. The maximum span that this type of floors with
main beams, can cover is 4.0 to 5.0m. It is composed by elements with rectangular section
arranged parallel to the smallest side of the environment where they are inserted, and with the
longer side parallel to the vertical section.
The beams section existent in the historical constructions ranges from solutions with simply peeled
truncated circular beams, to beams with square and rectangular section.
In Germany and Austria, the floors composed by square section beams were used up to the 800’s,
in the rest of Europe, and particularly in Italy, the relation base / section height equal to 0.7 was
introduced since 1600. This ratio derives from optimizing, in terms of bending resistance, the
beams made from a cylindrical trunk, (Barbisan 1997a). For this type of floors Rondelet (Rondelet
1834) defined a height of the main beams equal to 1/24 of the span to be cover, (Munafò 1990).

Figure 3.124 Simple unidirectional floors (Rondelet 1834)

The Renaissance treatises (Palladio, Serlio, Scamozzi, Milizia) and the subsequent technical
manuals, propose a distance between main beams equal to its width.
This arrangement appear due to aesthetics reasons, when the objective is to confer unity to the
underlying environment, and to static reasons, so that between the heads of the beams remains a
quantity of wall sufficient that does not weaken too much the wall and granting an adequate
resistance to the floor.
The resistance of these floors is however considered exuberant. For this reason, for practical
reasons and due to the availability of the wooden species, in the manuals of the second half of the
800’s, the space between the main beams increased to 0.4-0.5m, except in cases where tiles
areused for the deck. This modification originated an increase on the beams thickness.
Nowadays, the elements that are normally used, are the joists, which present a section with a base
between 3/4 of the height and dimensions between 9.0x12.0cm and 12.0x18.0cm, or the “panconi”
(boards), that come from the French constructive tradition, presenting a cross section with a
restricted base, between 5.0 and 8.0cm, and height equal to 3.0 or 4.0 times the base, (Ceccotti
2007).

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Normally the joists or the “panconi” are arranged with a distance variable between 30.0 and
50.0cm, and with a fixing support on the walls of approximately 10.0cm. The deck can be
completed with boards or tiles (the kind widespread in central Italy) or with boards and “panconi”
with thickness varying between 20.0 and 30.0mm (the most common type in Northern Italy is with
chestnut or oak boards).
In the first case it is placed directly over the joists, kept at a distance of 30.0 to 35.0cm, with single
or double board layer. On the second case the length of the boards is in accordance with the
distance of the joists, so that their extremities are in the middle of them and the unions are offset
(Ceccotti 2007).

Composed frame floors

This type of floor is normally used when the span to be covered is larger the 4.0 to 5.0m above
mentioned for simple unidirectional floors, or whenever the beams available do not have sufficient
length or section to constitute by themselves the supporting structure of the floor, (Ceccotti 2007).
It is composed by main beams placed along the shorter side of the floor where they are inserted
and secondary beams (joists) parallel to the major side and orthogonal to the main beams that
support them.
For the design of the beams that are a part of the composed floors, Milizia and Rondelet proposed
a height of the main beam equal to 1/18 of the span to be covered (Munafò 1990).
Usually, main beams are spaced of 3.0 to 4.0m, present a length ranging from 4.0 to 6.0m and a
fixation length on the walls of at least 25.0cm.
The technical-constructive evolution of the composed floors is the connections between the
primary and secondary frames. The oldest mode to connect joists to main beams are through:
overlapping of the joists, arranged head to head or offset, the connection of the joists to beams
throughout their entire thickness or overlapping with V shaped connection, to prevent the joist
displacement out of their supports, (Munafò 1990).
The Rondelet (Rondelet 1834) instead recommends the use of “filarole”, attached to the main
beams and bound with metallic bandages, while, since the end of 19th century were introduced
metallic angular elements replacing the “filarole” or the seconday wooden beams (“correnti in
legno”).

Bidirectional floors with double frame

Most wooden floors in Italy are unidirectional; it’s the obvious solution in order to better exploit the
wood characteristics. The bidirectional proposal, Figure 3.125, from a constructive point of view is
more elaborate and thus possesses a higher degree of complexity, due to the complicated
intersection of the beams being, therefore, much less used. However, this solution presents some
advantages, especially when considering the behaviour of the entire structure, both for the uniform
distribution of loads on all the supporting walls, and for reducing the stresses on the entire partition,
namely for its plate behaviour (Barbisan 1995).

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 Figure 3.125 Bidirectional floors with double frame (Rondelet 1834)

Mixed floor with timber beams and tile elements

The practice of applying tile elements on top of the main and secondary beams of reduced
thickness is documented in occidental structures from the XIII century. Despite the numerous
proposals found in the manuals of the late 800’s, this building system started to be widely used
only in the nineties, especially with the new building systems for mixed wood-tile-concrete floors,
such as the patent Lear that uses laminated timber beams, smooth tiles and a layer of reinforced
concrete on top, connected to the wooden beams through a metallic truss inserted in a groove
created at the beams extrados.
Another type of mixed floor wood-tile, common in the occidental construction since the XVIII
century, is the floor with timber beams and tile vaults. It consists of beams, roughly squared,
resting on the supporting walls, with a maximum span of 4.0 to 6.0m and placed at a distance of
90.0 to 100.0cm, with the section placed diagonally, Figure 3.126.
In the case of a diamond arrangement, the inclined beams surfaces serve as a support to the small
vaults between each beam, (Ceccotti 2007).
This floor is very simple and is used mainly in poor buildings, typically rural and agricultural
buildings.

Figure 3.126 Mixed floor with timber beams and tile vaults, (Ceccotti 2007).

3.3.1.2 With the main bearing frame with a length inferior to the span that needs to be
covered
These floors, which are described in detail in the manuals of the first half of the 800’s, with the
appearance of the steel floors began to lose importance until their almost complete disappearance
from the manuals of the early 900’s, (Munafò 1990). Therefore, to find some information about this
type of floors it’s necessary to perform an historical research.

Serlio Floors - "Solai alla Serlio"

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This type of floor, Figure 3.127, was designed by Sebastiano Serlio, Bolognese architect of the XVI
century, although it was very similar to the type of floor designed by Barbarano-Palladio, (Barbisan
1995).
Cavaliere di San Bortolo and Milizia reported "solai alla Serlio" that consists of eight beams
connected with overlapping with tongue and groove joints.
Rondelet (Rondelet 1834) proposed "solai alla Serlio" composed by four beams of length equal to
2/3 of the span to be covered, connected to each other at mid span. On the point of connection
between beams arranged in the orthogonal direction, there is an extension of the length equal to
1/3 of the span to be covered with the same dimensions of the main frame, (Munafò 1990).
Rondelet (Rondelet 1834) proposed tongue and groove connections or overlapping connections in
which the elements have only half section in the connection area.

Figure 3.127 - Serlio floors, (Munafò 1990).

It can be assumed, the hypothesis of floors for the towers, this bidirectional floor were born from
the necessity of creating sufficiently rigid horizontal diaphragms, and from the difficulty in rising to
altitudes as long as the span to be cover, (Barbisan 1995).
In the manuals from the 800’s, with the term "solai alla Serlio" are wrongly reported many types of
bidirectional floors.

Compartmented floors - “Solai a comparti”

In the compartmented floors the four diagonal beams, called angular beams, are used to layout the
floor and are supported, on both sides, by the perimetral walls, thus dividing each side of the room
into three parts. The resultant triangular spaces are completed by placing the joists parallel to the
angular beams and may eventually be reinforced at the intrados by a secondary beam arranged in
the orthogonal direction, (Munafò 1990).
Beam to beam connections and the beam to secondary beam are of tongue and groove type and
can be reinforced with metallic bandages.
The floor’s intrados is usually visible while on the extrados is expected a planking to stiffen the
floor, (Munafò 1990).

Polygonal floors

The polygonal floors have Dutch origins. This way of organizing the floor frames was revived in
Paris giving life to various forms.
Emy distinguishes it in two types: (i) concentric regular polygons with parallel sides and (ii)
concentric polygons offset in such a way that the corners of one match the side of the other.
The connections of the beams are formed by V shaped connections or by a joint at half thickness.
As for the other floors it’s expected planking at the extrados, (Munafò 1990).

Ray floors

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The main framework of the ray floors can be composed: by some beams that meet in the middle of
the room with one king post, while others are composed by different shapes bars or beams that
converge all in a central king post.
The secondary frame is arranged parallel to the walls of the compartment to be covered and is
positioned head to head over the main frame.
This type of floor is proposed to cover circular rooms or regular polygonal rooms with many sides,
(Munafò 1990).

Others

In historic structures in Greece, typically, floors are made of timber. Due to the use of timber ties in
most cases, there are several construction details in the connection between floor elements and
timber ties. Furthermore, there is a vast variety of construction details in the region of cantilevers
Figure 3.128.

Figure 3.128 The beams of the floor rest only on the interior longitudinal element of the timber tie, the beams of the floor
are extended to the outer face of the wall, thus resting on both longitudinal elements of the timber tie; the
beams of the floor protrude, in order to give support to balconies.

3.3.1.3 New generation wooden floors

A great progress was attained with the arrival of laminated wood and wood-based composite
materials such as Parallam, Intrallam and finally Microllam. The lamellar is formed by overlapping
wooden layers, with an ideal thickness of 25.0mm, glued to each other at controlled humidity. The
laminated beams are competitive, when compared to the reinforced concrete and steel beams, to
cover spans over 10.0-20.0m, for reasons of cost, lightness and ease of assembly. The Parallam is
produced by cut veneer logs to form sheets from which are eliminated the main faults; the sheets
are dried, fragmented into individual elements of 2.0-3.0mm thick, oriented and glued under
pressure with liquid hydrophobic resin. Derived from the research on Parallam, the Intrallam is
made of poplar wood splinters approximately 30.0cm long, bonded with resin under pressure. The
Microllam instead consists of very thin veneers made of wood pressure glued all together one on
top of the other, (Bazzana 1999). These technologies mainly used in North America are slowly
gaining ground in Europe; although they were born to be applied in buildings constructed with the
Platform system with the necessary adjustments may also find use in the Italian construction,
(Dattomi 1997) and (Ceccotti 2002), (Figure 3.129).

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 (a) (b)

Figure 3.129 Use of wood base materials on the construction of floors, (Dattomi 1997).

3.3.1.4 Damages: Symptoms, Causes and Intervention Criteria

3.3.1.4.1 Symptoms and Causes
In the following the manifestations of damage and degradation found in the elements that compose
wooden floors: extrados, intrados, primary and secondary supporting frames will be explored.
The biggest part of the degradation and damage possibilities that can be visually surveyed on
wooden floors are manifested through: (i) the deformation of the bearing frame, (ii) the failure of the
floor supports or through (iii) material degradation. Next are going to be identified the causes that
led to these symptoms, suggesting some criteria, methods and intervention techniques.

Deformation of the bearing frame

This damage can express itself through the loss (local or complete) of the floor plane horizontality
and can affect both the primary and secondary supporting frame alignments.
This type of instability is due to the loading state of the floor, and consequently to the beams
carrying capacity, (Munafò 1990).
The damage on the beams can be located at mid span or at the supports. The first have almost
always a vertical movement, and are due to bending moment that induces a tensile state on the
inferior fibers of the beam. The collapse of the beam at mid span can be either brittle, and as so
proceeds from the tensioned fibers up to the neutral axis, or vertical on the external layer of the
tensioned fibers after which becomes longitudinal according to the fibers direction.
The damage on the supports can be vertical, if they are caused by bending moment, inclined at
45° if they are due to shear, or the result of the combination of the two previous actions.
Excessive deflection of the floor evolves through various phases, the last of which, the formation of
cracks in the tensioned areas of the beam, is the most dangerous because it involves a reduction
in the section inertia moment and thus less resistant capacity.

Failure of the floor supports

The damage in the beams supports are directly related to (i) the transmission of loads from the
horizontal to the vertical structures and (ii) the connection between floor and walls.
Concerning the supports failure, it is possible to distinguish several types of damages, which can
affect both the horizontal structure, and the walls, (Munafò 1990).
On the beams, as mentioned previously, the failure occurs with the formation of lesions at 45° on
either side of the beam and due to shear. These cracks may be caused by an increase in the static
or dynamic loads, degradation of wood materials (defects, abnormal degradation or fire) or by

94
factors related to the construction of the floors (non homogeneity of the sections, inexistence of
load distribution elements).
In the masonry the typical manifestation is the inverse hyperbolic damage due to crushing of the
wall material under the beam support.
Another manifestation of damage in the masonry is caused by the supports vertical rotation which
causes also the movement of the floor supporting beams. This phenomenon is manifested by the
loss of horizontality of the floor, or by longitudinal damage following the beams arrangement.
Kinematic mechanism with horizontal components (earthquake, foundations displacements, etc...)
may cause a horizontal movement of the support with consequent detachment of the floors from
the walls, the sliding of the beams from its supports or punching of the wall.
The causes of damage relative to the structures in elevation concern: the high slenderness of the
walls, the modification on the static state of the walls (removal of some load bearing elements,
creation of openings), degradation of materials that compose the masonry (water infiltration, aging
of the mortars, etc...) or an increase of the static or dynamic loads.
3.3.1.4.2 Intervention Criteria
Nowadays, a significant role in the stability of the entire building is assigned to the floors. These
structures are required, in addition to an adequate performance level, a remarkable rigidity and an
efficient connection to the supporting walls, (Tampone 1996), especially in what concerns seismic
actions. In the recent past, according to several international codes, the wooden structures were
substituted by r.c. elements. The recent earthquakes showed the failure of the strategy that
frequently involved damages and brittle failures in ancient masonry buildings. For this reason, the
restoration of wooden floors is a key point in the seismic mitigation strategies, improving the
behaviour and efficiency of the whole structure.
Whatever system is adopted it is essential to preserve the building configuration, not to increase
the height of the floor, in order to maintain the inter-storey height, not to create level differences
with adjacent environments, stairs, etc…, and also not to change the dimensional relation of the
environments, (Tampone 1996).
The criteria for intervention are as follows:
• Reduction of accidental loads and live loads that caused the damages;
• Rehabilitation and/or increased of the load capacity;
• Remove the causes of material degradation;
• Modification of the static scheme.
The improvement of the bearing capacity can be made by:
• Regeneration of the structural element, i.e., retaining the original structure and intervening
on the existent materials to restore their mechanical properties;
• Increasing the section resistance of the floor supporting structure;
• Replacement of degraded elements with other similar elements.
An example of consolidation of the main beams is through the application or the inclusion at the
intrados of metallic elements, which increase the tensile strength. This intervention, in most cases,
is insufficient and must be done with devices resistant to compression and placed at the extrados,
through high complexity operations, (Tampone 1996).
Another set of interventions is based on the use of structural elements individually resistant such
as steel profiles. However this solution, although desirable in special cases and provisional
measures, in addition to the imposed visual alteration, it will release the original structure from all
load-bearing function, ignoring any reserves of strength in it.
The solutions that consist on eliminating completely the original wooden beam masking the
structural elements that replace it should be condemned. Solutions that have some success are
based on the "message" that the wood works in certain situations, (Barbisan 1997).

95
If it is not possible to do otherwise, it is preferable to add a wood element to the entire section,
possibly laminated, although it is always advisable to try to recover, by regrouping and
consolidating also with any reinforcements, the original nucleus, (Tampone 1996).

Table 3.1 Main intervention techniques applied to the main damage causes on wooden floors, (Munafò 1990).

Restoration and/or increase on the bearing capacity:

Insertion of a laminated timber beams or of a steel elements;
Substitution of the degraded part with another one made of wood.

Increase in the section resistance:

Creation of new supports with: lintels, cantilever or metallic supports, metallic elements placed at the
intrados or extrados of the existent beams, construction of a reinforced concrete beam;
Repair of the beams with metallic elements at the intrados;
Application of a wooden beam to the intrados or adjacent to the one to be consolidated;
Application of a flat steel or fiberglass strips at the intrados of the beam;

Beam substitution.

Removable of the degradation causes:

Treatments against insects and attacks from fungus.

Modification of the static scheme:

R.C. beam projecting from the wall as a support for the of R.C. beams;

Connection of the floor to the perimetral walls with reinforced concrete beam, V shape elements and steel
rods;
Stiffening of the floor extrados with steel ties, reinforced concrete slabs or additional boards;
Replacing the existing floor.

3.3.1.5 Seismic behaviour of wooden floors

On the seismic behaviour of existing masonry constructions, the role of the floors is, first, to
provide an effective connection for the walls subjected to perpendicular seismic actions, and
second, to transfer and distribute the horizontal actions to the supporting walls arranged parallel to
the seismic action. For these reasons it is useful a limited stiffness of the floors, for which should
always be carefully assessed the effects, inevitably associated to an increase in the elements
resistance, that can improve the structural robustness.
If the increase in the floor’s stiffness, in the in-plane actions, is such that allows a significant
distribution of the seismic action among the different masonry walls, this should be taken into
account by carefully considering the effect of this distributions; this concerns expecially the more
stiff elements, on which the forces tend to concentrate, and of the perimetral elements, in the case
of planimetric irregularities that accentuate the torsion effects.
In any case the quality and consistence of the walls and of the floor-wall connections must be
carefully assessed.
In agreement with the presented purposes, the floors with wooden structure should be preserved
as much as possible, also given their low weight and compatibility with whole structural
configuration and mass distribution of historic masonry buildings.
The floors must be effectively connected to the masonry walls in order to avoid the out-of-plane
deformation, through a sufficiently wide supported and through connecting elements that prevent

96
slippage. In general it is therefore advisable that a wooden floor presents a sufficient stiffness and
resistance to in-plane action in both directions, and that the connections to all the walls are well
conserved.
It is important to ensure, taking also into account the masonry quality, a good distribution of the
anchorage forces between floors and walls, and, in each floor, a tensile resistant boundary.
Beam slipping frequently hammers in the walls,

Importance of in-plane stiffness and strength (Horizontal Forces)

The main function of a floor in seismic areas is to transfer, through its strength and stiffness, the in-
plane seismic forces that are created in the floor to the walls parallel to the seismic action. If the
floor is deformable, it transfers the seismic action partly to the walls parallel to this action and partly
to the orthogonal ones, Figure 3.130.
Another function of the floor is to distribute the seismic actions among the different supporting
walls. If the floor is stiff and with low deformability, the seismic forces are distribute among the
different supporting walls parallel to the direction of the seismic action, in accordance with the walls
stiffness, and considering the distance between the resultant of the in-plane forces and the center
of stiffness, Figure 3.131a.
Instead, if the floor has high deformability, the seismic forces are distributed among the different
supporting walls parallel to the seismic action, in accordance to their influence areas regardless of
the stiffness of each septum, Figure 3.131b.

(a) (b)
Figure 3.130 Schematic of the seismic forces generated in-plane in: (a) a rigid planking and in (b) a
deformable planking, during a seismic event.

(a) (b)
Figure 3.131 Distribution of the seismic forces to the supporting walls considering: (a) rigid planking, and (b)
deformable planking.

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Importance of the connection to the supporting walls

During a seismic event the floor acts as constraint to the supporting walls, linking them together
and ensuring box type behaviour to the building.
This constraint reaction should be transferred from the floor to the walls parallel to the seismic
action, soliciting the floor’s in-plane bending; to this end it is however required a certain strength
and stiffness of the floor to avoid the rupture of the walls orthogonal to the seismic action after
excessive movements.
In the absence of an adequate connection between floor and walls, the seismic actions can
overcome the friction forces and the beams may slip causing several vibrations modes between
the various wall elements, which could cause local hammering damages on the wall.
In what concerns the capacity of the floors to distribute the in-plane seismic actions among the
various supporting walls, there are two types of buildings:
• Buildings of the first type - Buildings with the floors effectively connected to the masonry but
without adequate in-plane resistance and stiffness (floor without reinforced concrete slab,
or floor with simple or double planking).
• Buildings of the second type - Buildings with floors effectively connected to the masonry
with suitable in-plane strength and stiffness (floors with reinforced concrete slab).
The floors with plywood or with bracings (in metal or in composite materials), even in the absence
of an R.C. slab can be considered adequately resistant and rigid in thier plane, but these
characteristics must be verified through accurate modelling of the entire building.
What is certainly desirable in both new and existing buildings is to create effective connections
between the walls and the horizontal structures in order to prevent the out-of-plane overturning of
the walls, Figure 3.132.

Figure 3.132 Scheme of the damages caused by an inefficient connection between the main beams and the walls

3.3.1.6 Seismic improvement of wooden floors

In most cases, the wooden floors present in historical constructions, are considered deformable
until some elements are added to increase the in-plane stiffness (ex: reinforced concrete slabs),
and until appropriate connections with the perimetral walls are established. Indeed, in the historical
constructions, the floor can hardly be considered as an in-plane bracing element, but rather as a
dead load that unloads horizontally, during a seismic event, on the masonry, (Barbisan 1997b).
The in-plane stiffening of the floors, even limited, allows to distribute diversely the seismic actions
among the vertical elements, and implies, generally, an increased of resistance, which improves
the structure robustness, (Barbisan 1997b).
The need to stiffen the floors in their plane, ensuring the connection to the walls, is almost
exclusive of wooden floors, because in the cases of floor solutions in mixed steel-tile or in
reinforced concrete-tile, the in-plane stiffness is usually always assured by the concrete layer,
while the connection to the perimetral walls is ensured by a R.C. beam, (Bazzana 1999).
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However, it should be considered that the transformation of flexible floor into in-plane rigid floors
leads to a redistribution of the horizontal loads over the walls that can have positive or negative
effects, depending on the geometry of the structure and on the mechanical characteristics of the
materials that compose it. Indeed, the stiffening of wooden floors, unless accompanied by
adequate monitoring and improvement of the mechanical characteristics of the supporting walls
that result more loaded (in-plane) with this redistribution, can even be harmful. In this regard, it is
known how important is for the global behaviour of a structure to consider the stiffness of each
material that composes it, because the combination of materials with very different stiffness causes
abnormal and fragile behaviours if the structure is subjected to dynamic actions, as in the case of
seismic actions.

3.3.2 Other typologies

Since the second half of the XIX cent. other floor typologies were diffused, thanks to the
development of the iron/steel industry. More in detail, mixed iron/steel beams with fired clay
elements or small shallow barrel vaults in brick or stone were used frequently also in case of short
span (Breymann 1903) (Figure 3.133-Figure 3.134).

a) b) c)

Figure 3.133 Example of mixed iron/steel beams with shallow barrel vaults built made by solid bricks a) (Ferrini 2003) b)
with different brick positioning (Aveta 1987) or c) stones (Aveta 1987).

Figure 3.134 Example of mixed iron/steel beams with clay hollow elements. From (Breymann 1930)

The XIXth cent. iron beams usually have shorter and thicker flanges compared to the recent
sections. In general size and characteristics change in each country, being related to the local
industrial production.
The distance between the beams could range between 80 to 140 cm, supporting short span barrel
vaults in solid bricks/stones or hollow bricks of various shape and size. Flat floors could be built by
shaped clay elements clamped between them and frequently patented. The use of stones, usually
soft stones likes tuff, calcarenite or pumice is diffused, as well (Figure 3.133c).
A conglomerate layer completes the floor structure (Figure 3.133).

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Generally they are considered effective load bearing floors, enough stiff in their plane; they are
often kept without any drastic intervention, preventing hybrid behaviour with substituted structural
elements.
The seismic behaviour of such structures is, in general, quite, good. This could be related also to
the effective structural detailing of the XIXth cent. building.
Possible damages are related to hammering, which could trigger overturning mechanisms of the
walls, and to slight movements of the metals beam which could produce deformation in the vaults
(Figure 3.135).

Figure 3.135 Example of damage on floor built with mixed iron/steel beams and shallow barrel vaults caused by the
beams shift. From (Croci 2001)

3.4 ROOFS
The roof structure is usually composed by timber beams or trusses. The roof structure could thrust
directly the walls or simply supported as in case of trusses (Figure 3.136-Figure 3.137). In some
case, wooden tie rings mitigated the thrust from the roof, and constrains the walls on top.

Figure 3.136 Example of roof structures diffuse in Italy

Traditional roof structures include several configurations, spanning from about 5 to 20 meters,
according to complexity of the structure (Figure 3.138). The configuration of the secondary
structure supporting the covering influences the truss distance (Figure 3.139). Wooden structures
could have further configuration, as wooden vaults (Figure 3.140).
Roof damage could be revealed by a movement of the joints or of the ridge. Local damages
caused by the movement of the tile coverings are frequently causes of the beams decay. In Figure
3.142 the decay of the connection between strut and tie causes a sliding of the strut which thrust
directly the wall. Strut-tie decay is frequently surveyed due to the biological attack or moisture

100
conditions (Figure 3.143). The damage could involve the truss collapse or an anomalous loading of
the supporting walls.
Thrusting elements could contribute to the local or global overturning of unrestrained walls (Figure
3.144-Figure 3.145).

Figure 3.137 Classification of the roof structures diffuse in Italy according their thrust; a) Thrusting structure; b) Reduced
thrust; c) not thrusting. From the post-earthquake damage survey form (GNDT 1999), (Aedes 2000).

Figure 3.138 Example of roof trusses from (Rondelet 1834)

Figure 3.139 Example of roof covering structure (Giordano 1993)

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 Figure 3.140 Example of wooden vault (Giovanetti 1998)

Figure 3.141 The ridge movement produces the struts pushing on the side walls (Doglioni 2007)

102
Figure 3.142 Thrust to the load bearing walls caused by truss damages (Tampone 2001)

Figure 3.143 Truss collapse due to the decay of the strut-tie node (Doglioni 2007)

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 Figure 3.144 Roof thrust damage on a multiple leaf stone masonry (Doglioni 1999)

Figure 3.145 Hammering of the roof structures to the load bearing walls (Doglioni 1999)

3.5 SUB ASSEMBLAGES (WALL-WALL, WALL-FLOOR, ETC.) / CONNECTIONS

A good quality of the connections between floors and walls, between roof and walls and between
perpendicular walls is also crucial to reach a good global seismic behaviour of the building. Good
quality connections will drive the collapse of the construction to a configuration that requires a
stronger seismic action.
On the basis of several survey activities in Italian areas struck by seismic events, it can be
reasoned that the out-of-plane overturning of the facade is one of the most recurrent damage
mechanisms.
This structural behaviour is strictly connected to the presence and to the quality of the constraints
between walls and floor/roof structures. The presence of ties is another relevant factor in the
effectiveness of the constraints. The influence of the connection between orthogonal walls in the
overturning mechanism has been studied by various authors (de Felice 2001), (D’Ayala 2003a).
As detailed in Figure 3.146, unstrained wall could globally overturn, while the presence of the floor
constraint due to friction changes the kinematic mechanism triggered by a higher energy. Similar
effects are due to the constraints of roofs structures and ties.

Figure 3.146 Effects of the constraints imposed by floors and vaults (Carocci 2004). A unconstrained wall, B floor
constraint; C wall not restrained by roof structures; D roof restraining; E vault thrusting; F tied vault.

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Rondelet in his treatise (Rondelet 1834) explored the collapse mechanisms of an unrestrained wall
and the effects of one side and two sides constraints. The effectiveness of the constraints and,
then, of the global box behaviour of the masonry structure is related to the wall slenderness, as
well.
The mechanisms A,B,C of Figure 3.147, related to unstrained walls, are sensible to low intensity
earthquakes. In the following mechanisms D,E,F,G,H of Figure 3.147, the kinematic mechanism is
related to higher actions, due to the presence of constraints.

Figure 3.147 Effects of the constraints imposed by ties and buttresses on the box behaviour (Carocci 2004). I, II, III
Rondelet’s mechanisms A without constraints, B one side constraint; C one side and floor constraints; D two side
constraints; E wall restrained only by the floor; F presence of buttressed; G vertical bending of a wall; H III Rondelet’s
mechanism with tie restraining .

In Figure 3.148 the quasi linear vertical crack suggests that the connection between the walls was
defective, producing the walls separation due to out-of-plane bending.
Traditional masonry structures were restrained by corner tie stones (Figure 3.149); their
effectiveness in the wall restraining (Figure 3.150) is related to the dimension (Figure 3.151) but
also to the masonry quality of the walls. In fact, this influences the restraining possibilities of the
orthogonal walls, as appears clearly in Figure 3.79. Openings close to the corner decrease the
effectiveness of the constraints.
Several structures show the blocks cut with an internal angle, so as to 'fold' the stone around
corner's. It is suggested that this was incorporated as an earthquake prevention. It is worth to
mention the architecture of Armenian buildings or other buildings made by large stone blocks as in
Egypt or in Peru. It is interesting to note in Figure 3.152 that the stones have been cut so as to
continue only a short distance around the corner which hints at the idea that style might have been
involved (rather than, or as well as, function). Similar features were surveyed also in Italy.
The basement, the enlarged base, has an importance to ensure a stable base on which rises a
building (Figure 3.153), a historic monument for example. The vertical reinforcing chain made out
of cut stone, is another mean of reinforcement and consolidation of the building corners, which is

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generally used in colonial architecture and fortified architecture. The reinforced basement and the
rebuilt angle chaining using building materials different from the original masonry, are very
apparent actions on the frame and could belong to indicators suggesting knowledge of damages
caused by an earthquake.
Similar problems affect the constraints of the transversal masonry walls inside the building which
have shear wall functions (Figure 3.154).

Figure 3.148 Separation of wall due to out-of-plane bending. The quasi linear vertical crack suggests that the connection
between the walls was defective.

Figure 3.149 Corner details: a) absence of tie stones, b) ineffective constraints; c) good quality connections (Ferrini
2003)

Figure 3.150 Effects of the quality of the side walls connection (Giuffrè 1999)

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Figure 3.151 Out-of-plane overturning of the church facade: (a) mechanism 1; (b) mechanism 2. Possible failure surface
in mechanism 1: (c) facade and lateral wall made up of blocks of similar dimensions; (d) facade and lateral wall made up
of blocks of different dimensions (Lagomarsino 2009b).

Figure 3.152 Stone blocks cut with an internal angle to improve the corner connections. Picture from Egypt

Figure 3.153 Al Kamra Tower in Asila medina and rampar and tower in Salé medina

a) b)

Figure 3.154 Possible mechanisms related to the wall to wall constraints a) (De Felice 2001) b) (Doglioni 2007)

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In the building survey aimed to the seismic vulnerability evaluation, a deep control of the corner
detailing and of the wall to wall and wall to floors/roof connections is one of the keypoint (Figure
3.155-Figure 3.156). The presence of effective constraints and ties influence the kinematic
mechanism. Furthermore the building evolution could produce discontinuities between walls, or
weak constraints.
It is worth to remind the frequent use of decorative stone elements at the corner, which have not
any structural connection effect but their shifting can damage the masonry (Figure 3.157); similar
damage could be produced by apparently effective details disposed only superficially or not
extended in the depth.

Figure 3.155 Disposal of the tie stones surveyed in Syracuse (Giuffrè 1993)

Figure 3.156 Layout of the tie rods in a Palermo’s historical building (Carocci 2001)

a) b)

Figure 3.157 The stone block at the corner could be only decorative elements a) or only superficial (Doglioni 2007)

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The wall/floor connection is an important detail to survey. If the horizontal actions are not correctly
transferred and distributed to the whole masonry wall by an effective floor connection, out of plane
displacements of the wall or local hammering can occur (Figure 3.158a). These could contribute to
the beam movement and possible beam falling (Figure 3.158).

b)

a)
c)

Figure 3.158 The lack of connection between floor and wall can led to the beam falling and hammering increasing the
wall displacement (Doglioni 2007).

In timber reinforced buildings, quite often, the connection between walls is ensured by the timber
elements (well connected in those regions, as shown in the Figure 3.40 and described in §
3.1.1.4.1).
This is the reason why, the most critical (out-of-plane) failure does not take place exactly where
walls meet but after the strong region of the connection.
The effectiveness of timber tied are extensively reported in (Vintzileou 2008) and (Humo 2008).
Typically, a horizontal timber tie consists of more than one longitudinal timber element, running
along the perimeter of the building and by transverse timber elements that connect the longitudinal
ones at regular intervals (Figure 3.41-Figure 3.159-Figure 3.160).
In timber reinforced structures, special care was given by the constructors to the connections
between timber elements in the roof, within the timber-framed masonry of the upper storeys, as
well as between timber beams and columns in the ground floor.
Figure 3.160 shows examples of connection of timber elements in the corner of a building.
Furthermore, some construction errors are recorded in several structures. Those errors increase
the vulnerability of timber reinforced systems (Figure 3.161).
If timber ties do not continue in the corner zone of masonry, their tying role cannot be activated and
cracking (due to out of plane bending) cannot be prevented (Figure 3.161a).
Poor splicing detailing can contribute to the unsuccessful of the technique. When the nail that
connects the two wooden elements is corroded, the tying action of timber ties is lost (Figure
3.161b).
Timber reinforced systems pose rather difficult problems, when their preservation is sough.
The main problem is that it is quite difficult to replace or to substitute rotten member ties that are-
quite often-located away from masonry faces and, hence, difficult to reach.

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 Figure 3.159 Typical transverse connections of timber elements (NTUA/EPPO 2005) (Vintzileou 2008). (sketch by P.
Touliatos)

Figure 3.160 Connection of timber elements in the corner of a building

a) b) c)

Figure 3.161 Building errors increase the vulnerability of timber reinforced systems. a) If timber ties do not continue in
the corner zone of masonry, their tying role cannot be activated and cracking (due to out of plane bending) cannot be
prevented; b), c) Poor splicing detailing can contribute to the unsuccessful of the technique. When the nail that connects
the two wooden elements is corroded, the tying action of timber ties is lost.

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4 BUILDING TYPOLOGIES AND DAMAGE MECHANISM

Generally, the structures in the most damaged area are residential buildings with a variety of
configurations, sizes and openings. Frequently in the historic town centres the buildings are
organised into irregularly shaped blocks (usually with a linear layout). The buildings are connected
to each other as a result of growth and transformation over the centuries.
In historic centres streets can be very narrow, with high risks of injury of the occupants from falling
debris, and difficulty of access for rescue vehicles. In addition, there is often a shortage of refuge
areas, such as parks and squares, and the steep slopes and density of the buildings makes site
access difficult.
A general problem to all the building typologies and concerning the several modification in time,
could be related to the change of use of the building or of portion of building. Typical example is
the insertion of commercial activities at the ground floor, as in the case reported in (Vintzileou
2007). Excessive lateral displacements (Figure 4.1) were observed in a limited number of buildings
in Lefkada in which the stone masonry was partly demolished at the ground floor, before the event,
when the use of those buildings was modified from residential to commercial. The demolition of
masonry was done without previous design, as happened frequently in the past. Thus, the
secondary bearing system of the ground floor became primary. Since, however, its stiffness was
very limited, this system could not prevent large (permanent) horizontal displacements that led to
distortion of the building as a whole at the ground storey.

Figure 4.1 Lefkada Permanent interstorey drift in the ground floor (Vintzileou 2007)

4.1 ISOLATED BUILDINGS

Isolated buildings, in general, are the simplest typology, unfortunately not very frequent in historic
centres.
The general behaviour is reported in § 3.
The structural behaviour is related to the building evolution and to the technological detail.

4.1.1 Earth constructions

Isolated buildings are quite frequent in earth construction. Typical floor plans are shown in Figure
4.2. Single as well as multiple storey buildings are found. Originally, earthen buildings are
characterised by simplicity in plan and elevation. With the exception of colonial buildings in
California and South America, possibly inspired by fired brick architecture in Europe, buildings are
found to be round and square in plan.

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 L ≈ 50-60m

Fujian Tulou Temples and Rapaz Missionary Las Flores Adobe

Collective Housing dwellings Religious Building Ranch House
China India Peru California
Rammed Earth Rammed Earth Adobe Adobe
and Adobe
Figure 4.2 Some plan typologies of isolated earth buildings

4.1.1.1 Multi-Storey Buildings

4.1.1.1.1 Adobe brick walls, load bearing, topped by timber beams at storey/roof levels
Adobe houses with timber bond or ring beams belong to the vernacular architecture of different
countries. Those of Kashmir and Nepal are interesting examples of vernacular architecture
showing signs of seismic-resistant features.

Taq houses (Kashmir) consist of adobe walls held together by horizontal timber bond beams, or
runners, which are continuous around the perimeter of the building, and present at each floor and
roof level. The floor beams and the wall beams lap over each other, so that the walls are tied
together with the floors. Gosain and Arya (Gosain 1967) suggest that the weight of the masonry
prestresses the wall, contributing to its resistance to lateral forces. Some of the characteristics of
these buildings oppose some of today's commonly-accepted practices: mortar of negligible
strength was used; masonry leaves are poorly bonded; roofs are heavy. However, both Neve
(Neve 1885) and Gosain and Arya (1967) reported relatively undamaged survival of buildings 3-5
stories after earthquake damage. The literature suggests that this is due to the damping resulting
from the friction induced in the masonry of Taq walls, estimated to be in the order of twenty
percent, compared to four percent in uncracked modern masonry (brick with Portland cement
mortar) and six to seven percent after the masonry has cracked (Gosain and Aryia 1967). The
timber runner beams and floor diaphragms keep the individual piers from separating, which would
cause the house to break apart, so that even though the mortar is extremely weak, causing the
wall to yield under a much smaller load, the masonry continues to have a good chance of holding
together.
D´Ayala (D´Ayala 2009) has thoroughly studied a similar housing typology, the newari, in the
Kathmandu Valley, Nepal (D´Ayala 2003c). Traditional newari houses are usually independent,
rectangular, three-storey houses, in plan about 6m by 4-8metres. A rather common feature of
Nepalese traditional construction is the insertion of pegs, called chokus, to restrain floor joists from
sliding over walls. Two vertical pegs are usually inserted through a joist on each side of the wall.
Typically this will occur every two or three joists. From an external visual inspection, the chokus are
easily identified at roof level, due to the presence of the overhang; however they are also present
at intermediate storeys on joists passing over the internal wall. For the intermediate storeys the
common practice is for the joists to be anchored with pegs on the internal face of the external wall
and in between the two leaves. This practice is very effective in preventing relative sliding of the
floor structure on the walls in presence of lateral forces and hence create a box effect, while at the
same time, given the flexibility of the pegs and their position, does not prevent other movements
associated with temperature gradients and other environmental effects. The presence of the pegs
is also effective in limiting any substantial out of plane movement of the external walls due to
uneven settlements.

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Most commonly, the pegs butt on a timber wall plate running along the width of the façade, on
which the joists sit. In most cases the timber wall plate is positioned directly above the level of the
window frames, spanning the openings, and runs the entire width of the façade. While the best
traditional practice uses wall plates on both leaves of the façade (Figure 4.3), connected by
transversal struts dovetailed into them, as can be seen in some of the oldest and better built
examples, nowadays the common practice is for only one wall plate spanning over the internal leaf
of the wall .
From a structural point of view the double wall plate is not only effective in redistributing the vertical
loads more evenly across the wall, but, in the original arrangement has the double function of tying
together the two leaves of the wall and, in presence of lateral load preventing shear cracks in the
masonry from running from one floor to the next.

Figure 4.3 Facade mechanisms of failure, (D´Ayala 2009)

The most common cause of seismic vulnerability increase in houses in the Kathmandu valley was
reported in (D´Ayala 2006) to be the use of the dalan, a timber frame used in conjunction with
adobe building, consisting of columns pinned to the ground below and pinned to the beams above.
The use of pinned connections means that the use of the dalan can be compared to that of a
soft-storey structure, and its failure mechanism as that of a soft-storey as well (see Figure 4.4).

Figure 4.4 Soft-storey failure mechanism in newari house with dalan wooden structure

Rammed earth multi-storey buildings The Tulou is a unique building typology found in South-East
China. The massive rammed earth peripheral walls are up to 4-storeys in height and enclose
storehouses, wells and bedrooms for hundreds of dwellers More than twenty thousand tulou are
still standing and some are still inhabited. Tulou are usually rectangular or round in plan Figure 4.5.
One of the largest is Zaitianlou in Zhaoan, with 2.4 m thick walls and a diameter of 91 meters.
Tulou houses have been said to be earthquake-resistant buildings (Minke 2006).

Figure 4.5 Tulou housing, different typologies (after Huang Hanmin 1991)

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4.2 ROW BUILDINGS
The generalized characteristic of the historical centres layout is the structural continuity of the
buildings (Carocci 2001). In fact, excluding exceptional cases, frequently masonry buildings are
structurally connected with the adjacent ones in order to form a block (Figure 2.13). The latter can
be synthetically defined as a buildings system - also of remarkable dimensions - delimited by public
and/or private un-built spaces. The buildings can evolve in curtains along a street, in rows (Figure
4.6). The reconstruction of the row evolution is a keypoint in the vulnerability evaluation because it
can clarify the effectiveness of the restrains between the walls and locate discontinuity between
masonry portions (Figure 4.7).
This peculiarity of the historical layout is the reason why the analysis of each portion behaviour
does not result sufficiently exhaustive when not associated to a wider interpretation involving at
least the buildings directly bordering the one which is object of the analysis.
The analysis of a structural unit belonging to an aggregation is different than the case of an
isolated building because of the several interactions that the adjacent buildings do on the structural
unit which is analysed (Figure 2.16-Figure 2.17, Figure 2.24).
The basic structural interaction phenomena involve both negative and positive actions; adjacent
buildings can induce vertical loads or horizontal pushes (specially under the seismic action) or, on
the contrary buttress or constrain the adjacent buildings (Figure 2.24).
These interactions modify the collapse mechanism of the building introducing new different actions
and changing the constraint configuration (Figure 2.17).
As an example, it can be easily understood how some peculiarities of the structural behaviour
derive from the particular location of the individual building within the building system in the block.
This is the case of the extremity portions, often more damaged (Figure 4.8) and in the past
preventing reinforced by buttresses, counterforts or ties.

Figure 4.6 Row of buildings (Binda 2005a)

Figure 4.7 Evolution of a row of buildings (Carocci 2004) 1 isolated building, 2 building built adjacent to the previous one;
3 contemporary buildings built adjacent to the previous ones; 4 building built between existing buildings, 5 demolished
building.

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a) b)
Figure 4.8 Damages of the last building of a row a) (Gurrieri 1999) and b) (Avorio 2002b)

Damage often affects whole rows of contiguous buildings, with the damage concentrated at the
base of the structures on the up-slope side of the buildings (Figure 3.83). This indicates that the
rows of buildings lagged the ground motion as a unit, rather than pounding each other, which
would have caused the most damage at the upper story points of collision. Instead, as the
earthquake waves cause the buildings to sway, shear cracks opened in the ground floor walls.
With each loading cycle, the buildings toward the ends of the rows are forced away from the center
of the rows, or at least away from the section of the row with the most resistant or most heavy and
flexible building. This spreading of a row out from the center resulted in enough displacement of
the outermost building to cause it to collapse (Giuffrè 1993), (Carocci 2001).
The extent of the damage to rows of buildings is sometimes worsened by modern top story
additions which impose lateral force, not just on the subject building, but on the whole row.
The damage to individual structures could often be a disruption of the masonry in the highest
points of the structure, with an outward spreading of the walls as a result of a dearth of wall ties
through the building or effective tension at the connections to the floor diaphragms.
When assessed for vulnerability, buildings that are physically attached to each other in rows must
be treated together. The risk is increased if buildings in the row are modernized or replaced in
ways that make them taller and heavier.
Irregularities and weak points due to various reasons are assessed; namely, due to the
morphologic characteristics (staggering of the foundation level), to irregular elements both
horizontal and vertical (adjacent wall cells of very different dimensions or height (Figure 2.11,
Figure 4.9-Figure 4.11), elements resulting from the progressive closing of open-spaces), to the
integration of the buildings with pre-existing structures (castle or urban walls, ground supporting
walls, terracing supporting structures).
Missing or poor connections are pointed out; missing, namely, because of: a) the transformation
phases, b) the existing discontinuity (flues, chased plants, openings in breach), c) the opening
position (proximity to the corners, excessive width and length of the spaces, lack of alignment,
reduced distance between openings), d) the elimination of building load-bearing elements
(lengthwise partition walls between two close cells), e) the introduction of un connected additions.
Contiguities are defined between different building systems which introduce unfavourable
interactions due to previous structural interventions that have changed the stiffness characteristics
of walls or floors, or to the ratio between their masses, or to substitutions carried out with load-
bearing structure different from the masonry one (Figure 4.9-Figure 4.11).
The previous vulnerable elements should be interpreted in order to understand the overall
mechanical behaviour, including the slenderness of the individual walls and their connecting
conditions.
Hammering (Figure 4.12) between adjacent cells is a diffuse damage which could lead to the
overturning of the smallest adjacent volume. If the height of adjacent cells is very different the
higher one frequently overturns due to the stiffness change. Other relevant problems are related to
the lack of alignment of the floors or vaults: the seismic action can push on the common wall
(Figure 4.13).

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Damages abacus of cells within rows were developed by Giuffrè (Figure 4.14) (e.g. Giuffrè 1993,
1997, 1999) and (D’Ayala 2003a).
The damage prevision of a row building should take into account all these factors (Figure 4.15).
Figure 4.15 shows the seismic damage scenario of a row of buildings in a historical centre
evaluated from the inspection and interpretation of the building vulnerabilities.

Figure 4.9 Damages due height changes in a row and of the floor alignment (Gurrieri 1999)

Figure 4.10 Damages due to the lack of alignment in a row (Gurrieri 1999)

a)
Figure 4.11 Damages due to stiffness changes. Rotation, partial overturning and hammering a) (Binda 2006a)

a) b)

Figure 4.12 Interaction between adjacent volumes a) (Doglioni 1999) b) (Doglioni 2007)

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 Figure 4.13 Interaction between adjacent buildings (Borri 2004a)

Figure 4.14 Cell position within a block and possible damage (Giuffrè 1993)

a) b)

Figure 4.15 Damage prevision in a row of buildings a) (Carocci 2001), b) (Giuffrè 1999)

It is worth to mention also the case of the wide enlargement of Barcelona designed by Cerdà
(Paricio 2009) and recently studied by Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. The “Eixample” covers
a very significant part of the today’s urban texture of Barcelona (Errore. L'origine riferimento non
è stata trovata.-Figure 4.19), with problems typical of many cities all over the world and related to
the continuing changes in time, particularly in recent time of the buildings. This construction period
includes some 80 years beginning around 1860 and reaching until the end of the Spanish Civil War
in 1939.
The typical building from the Eixample consists of a masonry load bearing wall structure. In most
cases, the load bearing walls are in the façades and parallel inner walls (Figure 4.20). The
façades are 11 to 14 m long, allowing for two flats per story. The load bearing walls are
complemented with secondary perpendicular walls to grant stability. Unfortunately, these
secondary walls were not always built, leaving its role to the thinner partition walls. In some cases,

117
the interlocking between the load bearing walls and the secondary ones has been damaged or has
been lost even due to cracking caused by soil settlements. Generally, the load bearing walls of the
façades are about 28-30 cm thick, while the inner load bearing walls or the secondary ones are
only about 14-15 cm thick. There are to different types of buildings. The first one is the chafer
building, at the corners of the square blocks, while the second is the typical joint ownership house
placed along the sides of the blocks. The cross-sections highlight four typologies, including
buildings built above ground level, buildings with basement, buildings with a basement just under
the ground level and buildings with a semi-basement.
To characterize the earthquake collapse mechanisms, it is necessary to understand how the
structure works as a supporting element of the whole building. One must also understand how the
wall systems are articulated and how these create a system of “enclosed space”.
The load bearing walls are built of bricks set in lime mortar and plastered also with lime mortar.
Remarkably, a criterion in the specification sheets of the time indicated that once a existing
building was demolished, all those materials that might be usable were left for the builder.
Therefore, many current elements of these buildings came from other constructions, leading to a
first process of sustainable construction.

Figure 4.17 Current urbanism of

Figure 4.16 Current view of
Eixample. Distribution of typical Figure 4.18 Typical inner Courtyard.
Barcelona´s Eixample.
blocs.

Figure 4.19 Street façade showing typical buildings (Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes).

The buildings of the Eixample show some problems defects which may affect their overall strength
and seismic performance and that could be similarly found in several cities, even in recent
expansions.
ƒ Frequently, the adjoining properties share the same dividing wall.

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 ƒ For many years, and due to an urban density problem, many buildings experienced
additions of new floors, causing overload in the building’s structure, and the setback of the
upper part of the building (Figure 4.21).
ƒ In more recent times, the inner cores of buildings have suffered several changes at the
ground floor level, such as openings at the walls. These changes often waken the structure.
ƒ The buildings, and specially those built along the second period, have a significant amount
of external ornamentation. Many ornaments are not anchored to the structure and may fail
in the case of a seismic movement.
ƒ In some cases, an interlocked connection may not have been formed between the bearing
walls and the secondary perpendicular walls. Initially adequate connections may have
been lost due to cracking caused by differential soil settlements and other actions.
ƒ The Ground Floors are weak points with regard to the seismic action, because these levels,
intended to be used as commercial spaces, are more diaphanous. Often, the vertical
structure at these levels consists of cast iron pillars. The pillars support a grid of iron or
steel beams on which the upper load bearing walls are supported. Hence, the strength and
stiffness of the inner walls is interrupted or compromised because they do not reach the
foundation, but are only supported on a set of pillars.
On the base of the previous detailed observations and studies concerning the building technology
and most frequent changes, an abacus of the possible mechanisms was developed (Figure 4.22).

Figure 4.20 Geometric features of two different building Figure 4.21 Cross-section showing the additions
typologies in Eixample - Barcelona. of new floors

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 Figure 4.22 Collapsing mechanisms for the typical “Eixample” masonry buildings

4.3 COMPLEX BUILDINGS

A specific problem of urban historical centres is the issue of the seismic vulnerability of aggregation
or blocks of masonry buildings. They are the result of the progressive growth of the urban tissue
(Figure 2.13, Figure 4.23-Figure 4.24-Figure 4.25), in which elevations are added to existing
buildings and enlargements or progressive growths in plan are made by adding structural cells or
units in contact with the previously existing ones, so that often adjacent units share the same
boundary wall. Within a similar situation, the distinction of structurally independent units is
problematic if not impossible, and any structural analysis that aims at evaluating the “global”
response should in principle either model the whole block or model the structural unit with suitable
boundary conditions that take into account the effect of the adjacent ones, but both options present
high difficulties for professionals.

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Complex building could have the same or amplified vulnerability of row buildings, due to the
possibility of addition in several directions. In row buildings, in fact, portions interact only with
lateral cells. In complex buildings the aggregation could be at several sides, as well as the possible
lack of connection of walls which causes overturning, the discontinuities, the lack of constraints,
the different height of the portions, the different height of the floors, etc.
The evaluation of the expected damage should be carried out both in terms of direct vulnerability -
originating from the structural and transformation characteristics of each building of the block - and
in terms of induced vulnerability - originating from the mutual interactions between buildings placed
side by side, and from the damage effects on the open spaces (Figure 2.13) (Carocci 2001).

Figure 4.23 Complex buildings in Umbria (Binda 2006a)

Figure 4.24 Building typologies within the historic centre of Castelluccio (Cardani 2004), (Munari 2009)

Figure 4.25 Ksar Ait-Ben-Haddou was added to Unesco's World Heritage List in 1987. The Ksar, a group of earthen
buildings is a traditional pre-Saharan habitat in Ouarzazate province, a striking example of the architecture of southern
Morocco

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4.4 PALACES
Palaces are special building typologies. Usually they are listed as monuments, with more refined
details, lodges, wide halls, vaults, chapels and different functions. They could be fruit of an original
design or progressive additions of parts, including also connection to close buildings.
In the first case, the structure can have good connection between walls.
In the second case, the building can have the vulnerability of a complex structure.
Palaces frequently host public functions, e.g. museums, town halls, library, government offices,
schools, etc. The change of function could involve heavy intervention of seismic adequacy and
floor changes due to public access. In this last situation, incompatibility between the old and new
structures could produce unexpected seismic failures.
The Italian Civil Protection Agency developed a post-earthquake damage survey form, which
summarizes the most frequent damages (PCM 2005) (Figure 4.26).

Figure 4.26 Complex buildings in Umbria (PCM 2005)

4.5 CHURCHES
From a systematic observation of the structural damage caused by the Friuli earthquake (Doglioni
1994), the seismic response of churches may be described according to recurrent behaviours,
traceable to the damage modes and collapse mechanisms of the different parts, called
macroelements, which demonstrate structural behaviour that is almost autonomous. Typical
examples of macroelements are the façade, the bell tower, the apse, the transept and the side
chapels. This approach allows a very effective qualitative interpretation for churches, due to the
recursive architectonic portions “standardise” by liturgic and functional rules.
Most of the damage mechanisms are related to specific portions of the church (macroelements) as
exemplified in Figure 2.14 and Figure 2.15. It is worth noting that the concept of macroelement is
aimed at a more effective understanding of the seismic response of the fabric, but it is not strictly
necessary; the landmark of the methodology is the singling-out of the collapse mechanisms.
In the damage survey templates published by the Civil Protection Department and the Ministry of
Cultural Properties in Italy (PCM 2001) (Figure 2.2), for each macroelement, by considering its
typology and connection to the rest of the church, it is possible to identify the damage modes and
the collapse mechanisms. During the inspection operations, the surveyors must indicate: (a) the
actual macroelements; (b) the damage level; and (c) the vulnerability of the church to that
mechanism, related to some specific details of construction.
Slender walls, large, heavy architectural elements, such as domes and vaults, and the lack of
intermediate horizontal floors create a vulnerability that has caused damage greater than that
observed in ordinary buildings, even in low-intensity seismic shaking.

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The main churches have two or three naves, an apse and one or two side lateral chapels, a bell
tower, and sometimes a transept. Frequently the main churches are placed in the centre of the
main square and sometimes have staircase in front of the façade. In some cases, houses were
built around the main church up to the growing of a village. Minor churches can have a single nave,
sometimes with an apse, a two-pitch roof, and smaller dimensions than those of the main church.
(Lagomarsino 1997), (Lagomarsino 1998a,b), (Lagomarsino 2004a).
In some cases, masonry discontinuities are clearly recognisable and due to the several building
phases, repairs and interventions, as well.
The most frequent damages could be the following: (1) cracking and collapsing of vaults (owing to
their limited thickness and the lack of tie-rods); (2) damage to the pillars due to bending or shear in
churches with more than one nave; (3) sliding or overturning of the spires over the bell towers; and
(4) out-of-plane failure of the façade gables or apses. Out-of-plane failures of gable end walls are
common in structures with either wood or concrete roofs, where the wall is not well connected to
the roof. Typically, the inertial forces corresponding to the weight of the wall itself are thought to
ensure failure. In this case, the failure shows the effects of the hammering of the roof on the
masonry below.
In single-nave churches, the structural macro-elements made by the arch-pillar system (dividing
one bay from others) or the triumphal arch (separating the nave from the presbytery area) are often
present: typically, the seismic damage is represented by a four-hinge mechanism. It may involve
both the arch pillars, or only the one subjected to an outward thrust. Sometimes the pillars of the
triumphal arch work as shear walls, as they are generally quite wide because of the minor width of
the presbytery.
Figure 4.27 summarizes the typical collapse mechanisms of the churches (Lagomarsino 2004a).
More in detail, according (Lagomarsino 2004a) the following 18 collapse mechanisms, affect the
church macroelements:

THE FAÇADE

1. OVERTURNING OF THE FAÇADE

damage: separation of the façade from the lateral walls, in proximity to the corner or with
curved cracks in the lateral walls
vulnerability: 1. bad connection between the façade and the lateral walls
2. lack of longitudinal tie rods or buttresses

2. OVERTURNING OF THE GABLE

damage: separation of the top of the façade into parts
vulnerability: 1. presence of wide openings that weaken the façade (rose window)
2. lack of connection with the roof covering (hammering of the ridge beam)

3. SHEAR MECHANISMS IN THE FAÇADE

damage: cracks in the façade with X trend; central vertical crack; arched crack near the corner
vulnerability: 1. presence of wide openings, even if closed with masonry
2. roof thrusting on the lateral walls and lack of transversal tie rods

THE NAVE AND THE TRANSEPT

4. TRANSVERSAL VIBRATION OF NAVE OR TRANSEPT

damage: cracks in the structural arches; rotation of the lateral walls, with crushing or opened
cracks near the base of the pillars
vulnerability: 1. lateral walls too slender
2. lack of transversal tie rods or buttresses

5. LONGITUDINAL VIBRATION OF THE CENTRAL NAVE

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damage: cracks in the longitudinal arches; crushing or opened cracks at the
base of the columns; diagonal shear cracks in the aisles
vulnerability: 1. slender columns and central nave very high with respect to the lateral ones
2. lack of longitudinal tie rods

6. VAULTS OF THE CENTRAL NAVE

damage: damage in the vaults, with disjointedness from the stiffening arches
vulnerability: 1. vaults too lowered and/or too thin
2. presence of concentrated actions from the roof covering (due to wooden props of
the roof)

7. AISLES AND VAULTS OF THE TRANSEPT

damage: damage in the vaults, with disjointedness from the stiffening arches
vulnerability: 1. vaults too lowered and/or too thin
2. presence of concentrated actions from the roof covering (due to wooden props of
the roof)

THE TRIUMPHAL ARCH

8. MECHANISMS IN THE TRIUMPHAL ARCHES

damage: formation of hinges in the arch, with opened cracks, crushing of masonry and sliding
of stone ashlar
vulnerability: 1. thickness of the arch too thin or presence of masonry of bad quality
2. lack of tie rods or badly positioned; insufficient propping up by the lateral walls

THE DOME AND THE TIBURIO

9. COLLAPSE OF THE DOME AND THE TIBURIO

damage: formation of a continuum arched crack in the dome; cracks in the drum
vulnerability: 1. drum very high and slender (with big openings)
2. lack of hoopings and of external buttresses

THE APSE

10. OVERTURNING OF THE APSE

damage: vertical cracks in correspondence of the windows; inclined arched cracks
vulnerability: 1. lack of hoopings or of longitudinal tie rods
2. hammering roof covering or weakening as a result of the presence of big
openings

11. VAULTS OF THE APSE AND OF THE PRESBYTERY

damage: damage in the vaults
vulnerability: 1. vaults too lowered and/or too thin
2. presence of concentrated actions from the roof covering (due to wooden props of
the roof)

WIDESPREAD MECHANISMS

12. OVERTURNING OF OTHER WALLS (TRANSEPT FAÇADE, CHAPELS)

damage: separation of the end wall from the orthogonal walls
vulnerability: 1. bad connection between the end wall and the orthogonal walls
2. lack of tie rods or buttresses

13. SHEAR FAILURE OF THE WALLS

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damage: inclined cracks in masonry; disjointedness in the lack of continuity (closed windows)
vulnerability: 1. masonry of poor quality or too thin
2. weakening as a result of the presence of too many openings

14. HAMMERING AND DAMAGE IN THE ROOF COVERING

damage: cracks in proximity to the support of the beam; disjointedness from the R/C ring
beam and the masonry
vulnerability: 1. hammering roof, with absence of a link between the wooden beam and the
masonry
2. increasing of the weight and the stiffness of the roof (substitution with a R/C slab)

15. INTERACTION BETWEEN ELEMENTS OF DIFFERENT BEHAVIOR

damage: cracks due to the hammering between different parts
vulnerability: 1. significant difference in the global stiffness of the two parts of the fabric
2. lack of a good connection between the masonry in the two parts or of tie rods

THE BELL TOWER

16. GLOBAL COLLAPSE OF THE BELL TOWER

damage: cracks near the connection with the church; vertical cracks below the bell cell
vulnerability: 1. bell tower too slender and made of walls of limited thickness
2. masonry of poor quality and lack of connection between the walls

17. MECHANISMS IN THE BELFRY

damage: cracks in the arches; rotation and sliding of the pillars
vulnerability: 1. lack of tie rods or hooping ties
2. pillars too slender and roof too heavy and/or thrusting

BELL GABLE, SPIRES, AND PROJECTIONS

18. OVERTURNING OF PROJECTING ELEMENTS

damage: global permanent rotation or sliding; cracks at the base of the element
vulnerability: 1. lack of an effective connection with the church
2. element too slender

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 Figure 4.27 Table of the seismic damage mechanisms in the macroelements of the church (Lagomarsino 2004a).

The methodology and the abacus were used in the analysis of the damaged churches at the
Açores Island as reported by Azevedo and Guerreiro in (Sousa Oliveira 2008) or the most relevant
Gothic churches built in the city of Barcelona, namely the basilica of Santa Maria del Mar and the
church of Santa Maria del Pi (Cassinello 2005), (Vendrell 2008), studied by Universitat Politècnica
de Catalunya (Figure 4.28).
Byzantine churches are frequently octagonal with a main dome supported by four main arches
(one to four in Figure 4.29). In the four corners, four oblique arches (5 to 8) are arranged (allowing
for the formation of four quinches). Thus, the support of the central dome becomes octagonal.
In addition to the central dome, there is a system of domes and arches, supported by vertical piers.
Damage observations and analytical work have proven that this structural system is very
vulnerable. Actually, even under vertical loads alone, there are tensile stresses developing in the
region of supports of the curved bearing elements. The problem is typically more pronounced
along the North-South axis, mainly because the total area of the piers along this axis is significantly
smaller than along the East-West axis. This is the reason why the pathological image of those
churches is typical.
The methodology could be probably applied to other type of buildings with similar architectonic
characteristics.

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 Figure 4.28 Mechanisms of the churches of Santa Maria del Mar and Santa Maria del Pi studied by Universitat
Politècnica de Catalunya.

Figure 4.29 Plan of the main church (Katholikon) of Dafni Monastery.

4.6 SLENDER BUILDINGS (TOWERS, MINARETS)

Although characterized by different stylistic decorations, age of construction and original function,
their comparable geometrical and structural ratios yield to the definition of an autonomous
structural type. In a very concise definition, they can be described as monuments where the total
height is the prevalent dimension.
After the extensive survey of the damaged religious buildings, including bell-towers, carried out
after the 1979 earthquake in Friuli and reported in (Doglioni 1984) (Figure 2.31), several databases
obtained by direct surveys outline some major features of Italian towers and sub-types (Sepe
2008).
In the case of towers, several observations could be done, e.g. about the distribution of the
slenderness, taking into account minarets, towers, bell-towers, with circular base or squared,
adjacent to other buildings. Beyond this, a third class of likewise towers can be identified, which is
the so-called tower house (in Italian called ‘Case Torri’), typical defensive house, shaped as a bulk
tower.

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Besides the general characteristic of a building (architectonic, geometric, structural), the survey
records the post earthquake damages and/or the presence of structural damage of different nature.
In the case of towers, it is very common the interaction with other buildings (e.g. castles, churches,
etc.) and the several transformation and changes in use (e.g. the including of water tanks). Another
important point in the assessment of the seismic vulnerability, and in general in safety evaluation is
the urban position (Figure 4.30-Figure 4.31). Similar to buildings, the position of the tower with
respect to the urban context is very important, as it can strongly influence the possible damage
mode under a seismic excitation.

Figure 4.30 Position of the tower in the urban context (Sepe 2008).

Figure 4.31 Mantua: the façade of St. Andrew is connected to the bell-tower

Furthermore the presence of non structural elements, as turrets, bells and the presence of possible
decorations or furniture increasing the value need also to be surveyed and finally to quote their
level of conservation.
The load bearing walls of towers have generally massive thickness. Intermediate floors are usually
present, dividing the total height in storeys but frequently, being timber floors, can be in bad
conditions due to lack of maintenance. The staircase is in frequently in timber, or running within the
wall thickness. In defensive towers roofs could be flat and accessible, while in bell-tower are
generally thrusting wooden structure and host the bell-fry on top.
Frequently very small openings are present on the perimeter walls.
These buildings are featured by notable slenderness, and this also represents one of the main
differences from most of historic monuments (churches, palaces) or even ordinary buildings.
Their geometric, constructive and structural features are so peculiar that specific vulnerability/risk
functions require to be formulated. (Sepe 2008). Frequent mechanisms in buildings, palaces, or
churches such as the overturning of the façade are not present because associated with lack of
efficient connection at corners rather improbable for towers.
From mechanisms common to buildings, as reported in (Sepe 2008), it is possible to outline the
overturning of a wall with lateral side walls and corner failure, the horizontal arch effect and shear
failure. Figure 4.32 summarizes the main structural damages of towers.
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The former is an overturning with a vertical crack in the middle of the body, with development of
frictional stresses along it. This damage mode is particularly feasible when a vertical array of
openings is present on the wall surface enabling the onset of a vertical crack, so as to reduce the
frictional strength. Other mechanisms include failures caused by stresses very near to the
compressive strength at the base, and this can occur particularly in the presence of out of plumbs
or long term compressive behaviour and might be independent from seismic effects.
Tensional effect can be activated only in the presence of asymmetries in the geometrical and/or
mechanical characteristics or due to the presence of adjacent buildings of different height.
Some damages could be partially independent of the seismic effect and is associated with
geotechnical/ geological problems but that could be active during the earthquake .
Other failure modes concern the collapse of either additional parts or turrets or decoration standing
elements or to the belfry, as previously highlighted by Lagomarsino’s survey form for churches
(Lagomarsino 1997) and by Curti (Curti 2007).

Figure 4.32 Crack pattern of towers and interpretation of the damage mechanism (Sepe 2009).

The mosque minarets of Agadir were subjected to strong shaking of Al Hoceima Earthquake in
2004. A simple model for non-structural damage to the mosque lantern is shown in (Figure 4.33)
All mosque minarets are built to similar geometric specifications; a RC frame with no diaphragm
action save for the spiral stairs. Lantern is a non-structural element on the roof.

129
In some of these mosques, the lantern collapse, the shear damage to the tower base and the
plastic hinging at base of tower have been observed.

Figure 4.33 Failure model: lantern rotation and collapse and plastic hinging, shear damages at the base of the tower

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5 COLLAPSE MECHANISMS OF REPAIRED BUILDINGS

In general, the interventions should be aimed at improving the structural connections, and reducing
horizontal diaphragm deformability, at increasing masonry strength; furthermore they should
improve the behaviour of vaults, arches, pillars, etc. Nevertheless, in numerous cases very
invasive structural modifications have been applied, probably as a result of the assumption that
they should provide a higher safety level, but without any definite proof of their effectiveness.
There are many cases in which roof or floor reconstruction - during which original timber trusses or
floors were replaced by new elements of reinforced concrete or steel - were probably the main
cause of damage. Substitution of wooden roofs with reinforced concrete slabs is a very common
rehabilitation technique in most recent intervention.
In most cases it is difficult to categorise the intervention in good and bad. Their seismic
performance is, in fact, referred to the weak compatibility with the old structure or the poor
application/workmanship.
As currently reported in literature, the repair techniques are distinguished as traditional and modern
repair techniques, discriminating the use of techniques extensively used in the past and sharing
the same expertise of existing buildings. Modern techniques, were carried out after 1945, but
introducing techniques and materials, referred mainly to r.c., previously not used in the building
rules.
The use of r.c. structures to retrofit historic masonry buildings was strongly supported by the
changes in the building process in Europe, excluding masonry and turning to the extensive use of
r.c. structures and cement mortars. Furthermore, the calibration of numerical procedures and
research developed national codes mainly addresses to r.c. which increased the neglecting of
masonry building tradition but also of the repair materials.

5.1 TRADITIONAL REPAIR TECHNIQUES

One of the first aspects to be taken into account when dealing with the seismic behaviour of
existing masonry buildings, is the lack of good connections between structural elements.
Hence, to allow the structure to manifest a satisfactory global behaviour, it is necessary to improve
the connections between masonry walls, and between walls and floors and walls and roofs
(Tomazevic 1994), (Tomazevic 1996a,b)
This goal was in the past achieved by inserting ties or confining timber rings at the top of the
building (Figure 3.156-Figure 5.1-Figure 5.2) or at the floor level. An effective connection between
floors and walls is useful since it allows a better load redistribution and applies a restraining action
towards the walls overturning. In the case of timber floors, a satisfactory connection was provided
by fasteners anchored on the external face of the wall.
As mentioned above, the bracing is one of the most significant aspects of the earthquake-resistant
design. A basic principle is the monolithic behaviour, according to which the various parts of the
structure must be suitably connected between themselves to avoid the dissociation of their
elements under earthquake loads. This technique results essentially by the bracing arch which
binds the two different masonry structures to the arcades and which become bind together. They
are consolidated by a wooden beam system which connects the frontages of the galleries to those
of the load-bearing walls to ensure the stability of the walls with those of interior and avoiding their
opening and collapse. Their distribution is rather regular and is particularly observed in the
traditional courtyard houses in Morocco (Figure 5.3).
The use of this linking system shows again the manner of the earthquake loads resistance.
Nevertheless, an irregular layout or an insufficient disposal, accompanied to other techniques e.g.
floor/roof substitution could be not enough to prevent wall overturning, as in Figure 5.4: the tie rod
could not prevent the façade partial overturning due to the r.c. tie beam pushing. Similar structural
layout explains the damage in Figure 5.5.

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 a)

Figure 5.1 Ties disposal. From (Giovannetti 1998);

a) b) c)

Figure 5.2 Timber ties a) from (Giuffrè 1999), b) corner reinforcement c) arch tie in Umbria (Italy), d) arch tie House of
Gamal El-Din El-Dahbi in Cairo

Figure 5.3 Use of bracing and wooden tie in Rabat and Meknes medinas

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 a) b)

Figure 5.4 The tie was not sufficient to prevent the façade overturning caused by the pushing of the r.c. tie beam (Binda
2003c); c) the insufficient tie dimension locally punches the masonry wall (Doglioni 2007)

Figure 5.5 The (short) ties between longitudinal and transverse wall, arranged at the level of the floor, was (expectedly)
not able to prevent the out-of-plane collapse. This closer photo allows us to observe that (reinforced?) concrete slabs
were constructed at floor levels. The distance between the end of the roofing and the protruding part of the slab indicates
that the slab was supported by the collapsed wall. The effect (perhaps negative) of the slabs cannot be assessed just by
visual inspection (Andravida earthquake, 2008)

Building repaired in the past are characteristically heavy and robust at the ground level, with added
buttresses and added iron or steel rods that run through the buildings to plates on the exterior
(Figure 5.7). Over the centuries, such strengthening was probably done to stabilize and strengthen
masonry as the buildings were continuously repaired and adapted to new uses.
When a frontage wall or a great wall presents a cant, the response of the Community to this
problem is almost always the same one: the use of a buttress, a mass of masonry built against a
wall to strengthen it. This system is a consolidating element to the existing structure and it is
generally added to an older masonry building. Sometimes, the buttress is constructed at the same
time as the building construction, a voluntary and premeditated act to reinforce this construction,
generally at the corners of the structure. In the areas subjected to the seismic risk, the buttress
frequently accompanies the stone frame and becomes an essential element to achieve the building
stability.
Sometimes, the buttresses were used both as utilitarian and decorative forms. They can be also
used as staircase ensuring the access to the dwelling, built to play the role of the confortement, a
judicious way to associate reinforcement technique with comfort (Figure 5.6).
The unreinforced masonry structures have very low stress level and their stability, not strength,
governs the safety, but the geometry changes may threaten stability of the structure. For high
vaulted buildings, the arch will collapse and the buttress will remain standing in most cases. A
masonry buttress will fracture at collapse, reducing its load capacity.

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 Figure 5.6 Meknes medina rampart with buttresses and se of buttress in Chechaouen medina

a) b) c)

Figure 5.7 a) Tie rods and buttresses disposal (Giovannetti 1998) b) buttress damage by the wall bending (Doglioni
2007)

Intervention on the materials in the past was aimed to improve the original mechanical properties
of materials or to improve their performance by local intervention such as local repointing or local
reconstruction. It is important to stress that intervention event by traditional technique should make
use of materials with mechanical and chemical-physical properties similar to the original ones
(Binda 2006b), (Valluzzi 2008a).
The local dismantling and rebuilding (“scuci-cuci”) methodology aims to restore the wall continuity
along cracking lines (substitution of damaged elements with new ones, reestablishment of the
structural continuity) and to recover heavily damaged parts of masonry walls. The use of materials
that are similar, in terms of shape, dimensions, stiffness and strength, to those employed in the
original wall is preferable. Adequate connections should be provided to obtain a monolithic
behaviour. The effectiveness of the intervention is strictly connected to the recovering of the
previous wall properties; otherwise the seismic actions could expel the intervention as in Figure
5.8.
A discharging arch or relieving arch is an arch over a door, window, or other opening, designed to
distribute the pressure of the wall above Figure 5.9. An opening in a frontage constitutes a
vulnerable point in the event of deformation of the frame. The cracks of the front walls are found in
the contours of the openings where the stresses are most significant and in particular close the
restrained angles. The earthquake-resistant design codes recommend, for masonry structures,
rigid reinforced concrete, steel or wood framings of the openings and, in principle, must be
connected to the links of the walls. The wooden framings must be effectively connected to the
masonry. The openings in the medina, doors and windows, are framed by wood and well
connected to masonry. Cut stone arches are also located at the top of these openings.

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 Figure 5.8 Local repairs re-damaged by the earthquake (Binda 2003c).

Figure 5.9 Discharging arch in Sale medina and Rabat extramural

Interventions aiming at enhancing the in-plane stiffness of existing floors must be carefully
evaluated, since it changes the redistribution of horizontal seismic action to the load-bearing walls,
and this is seldom the objective of structural interventions. The role of diaphragms in the dynamic
behaviour of masonry buildings consists in transferring seismic actions to the walls parallel to the
earthquake direction (Tomazevic 1991); therefore, an effective connection between floors and
walls has a large importance as this can limit undesirable overturning of walls. Providing a further
layer of wooden planks is a limited intervention, that does not modifies the overall behaviour and
the force redistribution, and increases the wooden floors stiffening (Parisi 2002).
The historic centres mainly of middle age origin in Europe as well as the medina urban structure
were very affected by the constraints of the site and were organized in an irregular network of
narrow streets rarely rectilinear, which surround all sides the blocks, separate them from each
other allowing them a dynamic behaviour during the earthquakes. These separating spaces play
the role of an empty joint of separation. This urban morphology and building construction with
narrow streets are probably a solution to reduce seismic damage and prevent the houses from
collapsing.
The houses are semi-detached, overlapping and leaning against each other forming a compact
unit. Some streets are covered by galleries on top of which the houses extend and thus creating
roofed passageways called ‘the sabats’ in Marocco ma diffused in Italy, as well. This extension can
also be done in height thus from the starting of the sabats, which are extensions of the houses on
the top of the public space, which cover it and form passageway (Abdessemed-Foufa 2005).
Those are elements of cuts in the linear continuity of the frontages, realized either in vaults built out
of stones or bricks, or flat with wooden logs incorporated. Those are elements of reinforcement
which play a determining role in the bracing of the blocks between themselves.
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In addition, the medina urban framework is characterised by a certain number of arches built out of
stone or bricks, called “confortement” arches or contrasting arches whose relative flexibility and
elasticity allow the transmission of the horizontal stresses and their transfer to the ground (Figure
5.10). The buildings are not considered any more as isolated elements but as a compact dynamic
block. This bracing is always present in the narrow streets of the medina and allowed the
constructions not to collapse

a) b)

c)

Figure 5.10 a) Contrasting arches in the Fez medina, b) Contrasting arches in the Azzemour medina c) Roofed
passageways or ‘Sabats’ in Chechaouen and Rabat medinas

5.1.1 Earth constructions

5.1.1.1 Traditional means of repairing earthquake damage to earth construction
Crack repair
Technique Nature of technique Material Location/Source
1. Demolish adobe and Traditional, currently used Adobe Navarro Grau
rebuild 2006
2. Soft stiching Traditional, currently used Cob and Rammed Hurd 2006
but only reported earth

1. Demolish and rebuild

(Navarro Grau 2006) describes the repair of a severely cracked corner by means of demolition
and new build, and justifies it by explaining that the current state of the art of injection
techniques does not guarantee structural integration of walls, which is necessary to reinstate a
monolithic behaviour. (Navarro Grau 2006) also claim that the use of grout injections made with
stiff material, such as cement mortars, is not recommended in earth construction because it
creates stiffness discontinuities in the masonry which would result in stress concentration and
thus new cracking in case of seismic loading.
2. Soft stitching

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 Soft stitching is a repair procedure carried out in (Hurd 2006) which makes use of various
materials such as flat adobe bats, thick tiles, hemp, fibre mats or stainless steel expanded metal
lath introduced into a groove cut across the crack needing repair. The groove is cut to about half
the wall thickness, over the crack, with deep returning ends in the form of a staple and
continually wetted down with water during the construction process to eliminate suction. The
chase is then filled with alternate layers of fibres and adobe blocks until the top course, which is
10-15 cm deep, is reached. This is then wetted down and dry packed with loose material
identical to that of the adobe blocks. So as to form a dense rammed fill. This procedure is
carried out internally and externally. (Hurd 2006) recommends the use of stitches of varying
length to allow for stitching of subsidiary cracks and to prevent the formation of the new
cleavage planes that may develop from stitches of same length.
Soft stitching is not known by the author nor by (Hurd 2006) to test or examine the engineering
performance of soft stitching under dynamic loading. (Hurd 2006) (Figure 5.11), however,
claims to have observed the use of still - functional stitches, i.e. after an earthquake of unknown
magnitude.

Figure 5.11 Soft stitching carried out by Hurd in 2004. Photo: (Jaquin 2008)

5.1.1.2 Means to reduce earthquake damage

5.1.1.2.1 Vernacular means

Additional elements
1. Bond beam
To prevent: Lack of connection between perpendicular walls
2. External horizontal wall ties, Nepal (Chaudhry 2006)
3. Vertical wall ties, Nepal (Chaudhry 2006)
4. Buttresses (ZRS Photographic Database, Oman)
5. Males, or horizontal mattresses or layers in rammed earth or cob

5.1.1.2.2 Design considerations

1. Thickness
It has been claimed in the literature that in historical buildings, where height/thickness ratio is often
< 5 (Tolles 2002), wall thickness is often sufficient to prevent overturning as the walls are difficult to
destabilize even when they are severely cracked.

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 2. Roof
Support provided at the top walls by a roof system may add additional stability to the walls. This
point is contended by researchers. While a flexible and rigid roof is often claimed to be an
appropriate solution, the presence of additional loading on the walls might provide additional
stability (Webster 1995).
3. Openings

5.2 MODERN REPAIR TECHNIQUES

The post-earthquake surveys after the recent earthquake have shown poor performance of heavily
reinforced buildings that often made them more vulnerable. It appears that a large number of the
damaged buildings had been modified over the years to meet the needs of their users also
following in Italy the seismic code, but that such measures had rarely improved their resistance
against seismic events. As a matter of fact, these functional modifications, (remodelling, raising,
enlargement, opening or closing of new windows or doors) frequently added vulnerability. A
common form of upgrade has been the replacement of the old wooden floors with new floors of
heavy reinforced concrete beams supporting hollow clay tiles. This was often done without
upgrading the strength of the masonry bearing walls. Sometimes bearing walls were even removed
to open up spaces, resulting in beams located where shear walls had once existed. The post-
earthquake survey found that alterations and remodelling was rarely done with any heed of
regulations or seismic design criteria.
The compatibility or incompatibility of materials and systems is a good indicator of seismic
vulnerability. Recent earthquakes were particularly ruthless on masonry buildings that had been
retrofitted relatively recently with reinforced concrete floors (usually with recast beams with large
hollow clay tile elements spanning between the beams). One might have thought the stronger and
stiffer diaphragms would have improved performance, but these floors were not properly tied
through the masonry walls, and thus did not contribute to holding them together. A significant
problem with this kind of construction is that the absence of wall ties is not easy to verify, while the
presence of the new floors may give one the false sense of security that the structure has been
improved.
In the highly seismic Umbria-Marche region, seismic retrofitting may have been the principal
intention in replacing roofs. The added masses and the stiffness of the new roof cracked the
supporting walls and frequently causing their total collapse; or damaged the external leaves of
multiple leaves masonry walls (Figure 5.12).
The increase in the weight and the stiffness of the roof, whose retrofit usually involves a reinforced
slab insertion over the wooden ledger board, can lead to an increase in the horizontal seismic
forces that induce collapse of the masonry walls; moreover, the stiffness of the top most tie-beam
can obstruct the natural vibration mode of the masonry, thus inducing local high stresses in the
masonry.
Concrete ties, floors and roofs were frequently adopted to substitute timber floors and roofs. The
tie is positioned along the four sides of the structure as a connection floor to walls. In an existing
building while the roof concrete tie can be positioned on the whole thickness of the top wall, the r.c.
ties at each floor can only be inserted in part of the section after partial demolition of it. In this case
it is very difficult to realise a stiff connection to the existing wall. In general this connection is very
difficult when the wall is made of a multiple leaf irregular stone masonry. Figure 5.13 and Figure
5.14 show the effects of the tie beam insertion, often hammering or building rotation but also wall
collapses.
Conversely, introduction of tie-beams in the masonry thickness at intermediate storeys should be
definitely be avoided, due to their damaging effects on perimeter walls, often causing also uneven
load redistribution among masonry leaves and/or pounding effects on the external masonry leaves
in case of seismic excitation Figure 5.15.

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 a) b)

Figure 5.12 Structural failure due to the insertion of a stiff r.c. roof a) (Avorio 2002b), b) (Binda 2006).

The damage observed more frequently were the following: (i) partial eccentric loading of the walls
(Borri 2004a), (ii) lack or poor connection of the tie beam to the walls (Binda 2003c), (Binda
2006a,b).
The seismic events, then, showed that these elements cannot transmit the horizontal actions to the
walls and neither can connect the two masonry leaves, of which one remains free and can rotate
freely and overturn (Figure 5.16) (Binda 2003c, 2006b), (Borri 2004a).
The collapse mechanism of the masonry is not for in plane shear as expected after the floor
substitution, but a partial overturning mechanism of the external leaf of the wall which starts for
lower values of the expected collapse coefficient.
In most case application of modern technique does not prevent overturning or other kinematic
mechanism but acts only on the shape of the damaged area (Figure 5.16). Unsuccessful of the
vault straightening by adding a r.c. structure (Gurrieri 1999), (Avorio 2002a) was surveyed as well
(Figure 5.17). In recent years, experimental research focused on the behaviour of masonry vaults
strengthened by new composite materials, as carbon or glass FRPs, placed at the intrados (inner
surface) or at the extrados (outer surface) of the structure (Valluzzi 2001b) (Panizza 2008).
A multilayer system of adhesion based on epoxy adhesives and designed to provide a support as
homogeneous as possible for the fibers has been adopted. Nevertheless, further research is
needed.
An abacus of damages related to these diffused building retrofitting technique is proposed in
Figure 5.18.
Furthermore several techniques applied to repair or to strengthen the masonry improving the
masonry quality or compactness showed their ineffectiveness, as jacketing and grouting, as well
(Figure 5.19) (Binda 2003c), (Binda 2006).

Figure 5.13 Damages due to the introduction of r.c. tie-beams surveyed after the Umbria earthquake (Binda 2002c)

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 Figure 5.14 A r.c. tie beam is constructed under the opening. Disintegration of the pier and horizontal sliding is
observed.

a) b) c)

Figure 5.15 Damages due to the introduction of r.c. tie-beams in the masonry thickness at intermediate storeys a), b)
from (Gurrieri 1999) and (Avorio 2002b) c) (Binda 2003c)

Figure 5.16 The presence of r.c. tie beams does not prevent the wall overturning but changes the shape of the damaged
area (Borri 2004a)

Figure 5.17 Unsuccessful of the vault straightening by adding a r.c. structure (Gurrieri 1999), (Avorio 2002a)

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 Figure 5.18 Modern techniques often changes the expected seismic behaviour (Binda 2006a)

(a) (b) (c) (d) (e)

Figure 5.19 (a) Failure due to insufficient steel mesh overlapping and (b) insufficient transversal ties confining action; (c)
lack of connection between nets; (d) absence of connectors, (e) unsuccessful of grouts due to the lack of diffusion: only
some spots were injected in the case of this wall with a very low percentage of voids..

5.2.1 Earthen buildings

5.2.1.1 Crack Repair
1. Hard, i.e. Cob and Rammed earth (Hurd 2006), (Schröder 2010)
stainless steel
stitching
2. Grout injection Adobe (Chaudhry 2007), (Webster 2006)

5.2.1.2 Strength-based retrofit

Strength-based retrofit is based on introducing and independent structural frame of reinforced
concrete or steel, requiring the removal of large amounts of historic material (Hardy 2006).
The use of reinforced concrete is a practice which in the past has and is sometimes still applied to
earthen constructions, according to the same engineering strength-design principles which lead do
the use of reinforced concrete for the restoration of other masonry structures. For instance, prior to
the publication of the CHBC California Historical Building Code (CHBC), made mandatory in 1985,
seismic retrofitting for adobe buildings in California was based on the UBC, which does not
recognise any seismic load resistance for adobe. Therefore, retrofitting consisted in adding shear
walls and constructing independent steel or concrete structures designed to carry all loads from
horizontal members. This resulted in the destruction of historic fabric and removal of stabilising
loads at the tops of adobe walls.

141
The validity of applying strength design concepts to earthen structures has not been proven in
practice to be effective.
On site observation of seismic damage to earthen structures (Langenbach 2004; Cancino 2009;
Navarro Grau 2006) indicate, on the contrary, that the presence of reinforced concrete elements
has lead to the damage, and not the protection, of earthen structures.
Strength design is also at the basis of the use of steel reinforcement bars as a means of reinforcing
earthen walls. Since earthen walls do not bond with conventional rebar and therefore, the yielding
stress conditions on which strength design is based cannot be met, the use of steel as internal
reinforcement has also been opposed (Webster 1995). Reinforcement (steel) can bond to the
adobe if embedded in cement mortar or grout (Chaudhry 2007) but might results in stress
concentration and thus new cracking in case of seismic loading.
It is claimed (Barrow 2006) that thick adobe walls do have energy dissipation characteristics in the
post-elastic phase.
As well described by Langenbach (2004), if both the restored houses at Arg-e-Bam and the new
houses suffered more than the untouched ancient abandoned earthen ruins in the desert nearby,
as also reported by JSEE (2004), then the problem had less to do with earthen construction per-se
than it had to do with the particular form of earthen construction that was practiced in modern Bam.

5.2.1.3 Stability-based retrofit

Stability-based retrofitting (Webster 2006), which has been introduced more recently, is less
invasive, and consists in limiting relative displacement between elements of a structure and using
gravity as a restoring force.
Since the overturning of walls is the first mode of failure common to adobe buildings (Tolles 2006),
the first step towards stability under earthquake loading is to attach structure´s vertical elements to
its horizontal elements.
For instance, for gable walls or any walls susceptible to overturning (i.e. of thinner walls between
support points), full-height centre core rods can be introduced to provide restraint, prevent out-of-
plane failure, and increase wall ductility in both in-plane and out-of-plane directions (Tolles 2006)
Stability-based measures do not stiffen the structure and do not come into play until old cracks
reopen, new cracks have developed, and enough displacement occurs to engage the stabilising
measures, which work in two ways (Webster 2006):

1) They increase structural damping due to friction hysteresis across the cracks
2) They lower response frequency caused by the rocking of walls

Webster (2006) provides examples of historical buildings in California where stability-based

measures were used between 1992 and 2005.
Stability based methods, after Webster (2006), with some additions, are considered at three
different levels:
1) Structural continuity at floor/roof
2) Out-of-plane overturning stability
3) Containment of wall material

1) Structural continuity at floor/roof level

a) Existing (or introducing a) timber bond beam interconnecting all walls
b) Top-of-wall continuity (stainless steel straps, cables), through-wall tied
c) Connecting discontinuous existing bond beam elements, incl. previously reinforced
beams introduced
d) Addition to a): introduction of wooden pegs as shear connectors

142
 References
a) Navarro Grau2006
a) Sikka and Chaudhy 2006. Nako preservation project
b) Hurd 2006
c) Webster 2006, Shafter Courthouse, USA

2) Out-of-plane overturning stability (Anchoring together roof, walls, and floors)

a) Top-of-wall pins (steel or fibreglass) (grouted in place with a fly-ash/soil mixture

(Roselund 1990)
b) Whereas (Tolles 2006) mentions epoxy grout being used with stainless steel tie rods
c) Vertical center core rods (steel or fibreglass). Design of the fibre-rods based on 0.8*
weight of the gable-wall section above bond beam (Webster 2006). Advantages of
earthen grouts (Barrow et al. 2006) are compatibility with historic adobe and
reversibility (Barrow 2006): the consist of adobe soil, sand, a small amount of Portland
cement, ground additive (Sika ground aid) to minimise shrinking during curing.
d) Diaphragm (partial or full, i.e. plywood)
e) Top-of-wall anchorage
f) Through-wall floor anchorage (in the case of Tolle 2006, with viscous dampers)
References
d) Tolles 2006, testing model

3) Containment of wall material

a) Horizontal and/or vertical straps or cables, through-wall tied
b) Horizontal and/or vertical center core rods
c) Surface mesh, through-wall tied (polymer with mud plaster or welded wire mesh)
d) Top-of-wall continuity hardware, through-wall tied, in conjunction with top of wall pins
c) Torrealva et al. (Torrealva 2006) tested Polymer mesh geogrid completely covering
the walls on both sides. The mesh was connected with plastic threads through a whole
previously drilled in the wall. Spacing every 40cm (Torrealva 2006). Covering the wall
with mud plaster greatly increases the initial shear strength and stiffness of wall,
controlling the lateral displacements and presenting the cracking of the wall to great
extent. The cost of the mesh technique can be reduced by placing mesh only at.. not
over the whole wall. The amount of mesh is more important than the quality of the
mesh
(Torrealva 2006) specifies that in order to maintain the integrity of the adobe walls, both
horizontal and vertical reinforcement are necessary
c) Use of organic textile fibres (jute or coir) as natural, organic instead of polymer fibres –
under plaster (suggested by Sikka and Chaudry, 2006) – yet to be tested
Seismic retrofit is believed to have an effect only once ground shaking > 0.3g (Webster 2006). In-
plane diagonal and X-Cracking at corners and doorways result from PGA levels as low as 0.1-0.2g.
The relationship between damage and earthquake severity in relation to strength-based,
stability-based and lack of retrofit as derived is presented in (Tolles 2002). (Ginell 1995) assesses
the effectiveness of some of these retrofits in terms of earthquake severity as shown in Figure
5.20.

143
 Figure 5.20 Effectiveness of Stability-Based Retrofitting

Damage related to the use of the aforementioned retrofitting techniques includes cracking damage
propagating from structural anchorage and cross-ties. Due to the weakness of earth as a structural
material, low stress concentrations at these locations, which can hardly be avoided, generally lead
to cracks and crushing of material. Anchorage can pull into wall thus being ineffective in
adequately restraining out-of-plane motion or initiated cracks.
Wall anchors (or tie rods) retrofitted with the intention of holding walls together with perpendicular
walls or diaphragms are claimed in (Tolles 1996) to be difficult to attach to adobe successfully
because of the material´s weakness in shear and tension.
In order to make the use of anchorage effectively, it is important to understand the behaviour of
earth around the anchors.

5.2.1.3.1 Additional repair techniques

Webster (2006) describes the seismic strengthening of a wall at O´Hara Adobe which was initially
thought to be 90 cm thick, but was later found to consist of two separate leaves, each 30cm thick.
The wall such was filled with urethane-type foam of 48 kg/m³ between walls and super-lightweight
(1121 kg/m³) concrete under and beside the already existing bond beam. (Webster 2006).
Alternative measures should be researched and tested.

144
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