Seismic response history analysis including out-of-plane collapse of unreinforced masonry infill walls in RC frame structures

This chapter aims to use a numerical model to characterize seismically induced out-of-plane failures of Unreinforced Masonry (URM) infill walls in realistic Reinforced Concrete framed structures. In spite of their influence on the seismic behaviour of framed structures, masonry infill walls are often neglected in design practice. Past earthquakes have shown that URM infills can also be susceptible to high levels of damage, including collapse, in the out-of-plane direction. If studies dedicated to out-of-plane (OOP) behaviour of masonry infill walls undergoing seismic action are fewer than those about the in-plane (IP) behaviour, even less numerous are studies that examine the interaction between the IP and the OOP responses of infill walls. I. Iervolino et al. described a comprehensive framework to build sets of natural records for seismic analysis of structures. A specifically assembled suite of ten bi-directional natural ground motions was used as the seismic input during the analyses.