Reliability analysis of reinforced concrete shear walls considering multiple failure mechanisms

The coupling effect of material nonlinearity and randomness leads to the uncertainty of failure mode for reinforced concrete (RC) shear walls under the static pushover loads, i.e., flexural failure and shear failure. However, it is difficult to accurately determine the reliability of shear failure components using the threshold value of flexural failure. Therefore, the calculation method of shear capacity of shear walls based on the kinematic theory is adopted to predict the shear capacity of 27 RC shear walls and the lateral load-displacement curves of eight RC shear walls. The uncertainties of axial load, dimensions and material properties are taken into account to conduct the stochastic nonlinear analysis of RC shear walls under lateral load. The reliability of RC shear walls considering multiple failure modes is analyzed based on the probability density evolution method by defining the failure domain and introducing the absorbing boundary condition. The results indicate that the proposed method can accurately predict the nonlinear response of shear walls with different failure modes, and the essence of multiple failures is the result of various evolution of internal force redistribution. The variation coefficients of displacement at peak value and the residual bearing capacity for shear walls with multiple failure modes reach 0. 3 or above. Considering the influence factors of concrete compressive strength, longitudinal reinforcement ratio, stirrup ratio and aspect ratio for a specific shear wall, it is found that the reliability of RC shear walls under static pushover load is improved significantly by increasing the compressive strength of concrete. © 2024 Science Press. All rights reserved.