Behavior of reinforced concrete frame with masonry infill wall subjected to vertical load

The effectiveness of masonry infill wall on behavior of a Reinforced Concrete (RC) frame subjected to a column failure is studied experimentally. For this reason, one full scale RC frame designed according to Eurocode is statically tested to investigate the behavior of the frame with and without masonry infill wall. The obtained results show that infill wall can significantly increase the load carrying capacity of RC frame and thus serve as an important robustness reserve in the case of unpredictable extreme events (i.e. local impact, blast or earthquake). A photogrammetry analysis is carried out to study the behavior of the structure. Results give valuable information about the alternative load path, transfer of the applied load to the column and beams, and interaction forces between RC frame and infill wall. At the end, the experimental program is simulated by the OpenSees software to study the behavior of the frame. After having demonstrated that this model can predict the load deflection with good accuracy, a parametric study is conducted to evaluate the effect of the percentage of longitudinal reinforcement ratio of beams and columns on the load carrying capacity of the infilled RC frame.