Earthquake-proof system for masonry infills in RC frame structures
Abstract
The use of masonry infill walls in RC frame structures is common in many countries, even in seismically active areas, where the observations made after strong earthquakes have shown that masonry infills significantly modify the dynamic behaviour of the structure, thus causing total collapses of buildings and loss of human lives. The innovative system called Innovative Decoupled Infill System (INODIS) was developed with the aim to improve the behaviour of infilled RC frames by decoupling the frame and the masonry infill. Description of the system with the installation steps is given with the experimental tests showing that INODIS system highly reduces the activation of infills, thus enables reaching high in-plane drifts without having any damage and at the same time provides stable and reliable connection in out-of-plane direction. Also, the micro model showed that INODIS system improves the behaviour of AAC masonry infills by reducing the level of damage in the walls and postponing inf...ill activation to higher drift levels.