The structural assessment of masonry remains an open challenge due to its intrinsic
nonhomogenous nonisotropic and nonlinear behavior. Aiming at providing a tool for
structural applications, this paper presents the formulation and implementation in a
FE code of a simple constitutive model to describe the behavior of masonry walls
regarded as elastoplastic homogenized anisotropic plates. The model is based
on few geometrical and mechanical parameters that can be easily detected
from masonry typology. Nonetheless, it can capture the essential features
of the structural behavior of ancient masonry, i.e., the failure in traction
and the anisotropic behavior deriving from the joints layout. The model
succeed in predicting the failure mechanism and load carrying capacity under
different boundary and loading conditions, including soil settlement and
seismic loading. Its validation is finally carried out for some selected case
studies.
Keywords
masonry, FE model, failure pattern, plastic strain,
settlement, earthquake loads