Infill wall/Gable wall

Introduction: The infill wall is the supported wall that closes the perimeter of a building
(generally made of brick masonry, stone masonry, concrete blocks, or reinforced concrete)
serves to separate inner space from the outer space and. The infill wall has the unique static
function to bear its own weight.

The use of masonry infill walls, especially in reinforced concrete frame structures, is
common in many countries. In fact, the use of masonry infill walls offers an economical and
durable solution. They are easy to build, attractive for architecture and has a very efficient
cost-performance.

It is widely known and reported that infill walls in reinforced concrete frame buildings cause
an increase in lateral stiffness, strength, and energy dissipation capacity. Whether this
behaviour is favourable or not, the infill walls are usually the first elements to be damaged in
seismic events.

Earthquake observations reveal that the presence of masonry infills within the frame structure
and their influence on structural behaviour is always overlooked in the design and
construction practice. The falling of the masonry infill walls of frame structures causing loss
of life is a well-known fact and building codes, including AS1170.4 2007 Australian
Earthquake Code requires that masonry infills must be secured to frame structures. And, it is
now a recognized fact that the presence of masonry infill walls is one of the major reason of
causing the collapse or damage to building structures during an earthquake.

It is also important to state that observations have revealed that the majority of earthquake
damage to residential buildings is occurring in buildings less than approximately eight (8)
story in height with natural frequencies much closer to dominant ground motion frequencies
and more potential for resonance conditions. These buildings with low height to buildings
width/depth ratios represent stiff framed structures. The addition of masonry infill walls
further stiffens the overall structural frame behaviour significantly.

The presence of masonry infills can result in higher stiffness; however sudden reduction of
stiffness due to damage of infill walls can lead to the formation of a soft story mechanism,
which, due to the introduction of joint damage, can occur at any floor level and independently
of the distribution of the infills along the elevation.

Modes of failure
a) In plane failure
b) Out of plan failure
In plane failure
There are four typical modes of damage in plane failure.

1) Crushing at the centre of the panel.

2) Crushing at the corners.
3) Sliding shear failure.
4) Diagonal tension cracks.

(a) (c)

(b) (d)
Figure 1(a) crushing at the centre, figure 1(b) sliding shear failure. Figure 1(c) crushing at the corners
Figure 1(d) diagonal cracking. Adopted from (Tasligedik, Pampanin et al. 2011)
Out of plane failure
Unreinforced masonry buildings are the most vulnerable to flexural out-of-plane failure. If the
connection between the walls and floors is not adequately restrained, the whole wall panel or of a
significant portion of it will overturn due to seismic excitation in the perpendicular direction to
the wall plane. Fig. 1 shows a view of out-of-plane collapse of load bearing walls.
.

Figure 1 A view of load bearing walls collapsed in the out-of-plane direction during Bingl
Earthquake. Adopted from (Doangn, Ural et al. 2008)

Parapet and gable wall failures fall into this category. If unrestrained these non-structural
unreinforced masonry elements behave as a cantilever wall extending beyond the roof line Gable
walls located at the top of the buildings are subjected to the greatest amplification of the ground
motions, and are consequently prone to flexural failures under the roofs. It is stated in the
masonry buildings section of TEC that in the case where the height of the end wall resting on the
horizontal bond beam at the top story exceeds 2m, vertical and inclined bond beams shall be
constructed. But almost all the buildings which have large gable walls in the earthquake region
did not satisfy this requirement.

Reinforcement detail according to ACI code

Walls more than 10 in. thick, except basement walls, shall have reinforcement for each
direction placed in two layers parallel with faces of wall in accordance with the following:
(a) One layer consisting of not less than one-half and not more than two-thirds of total
reinforcement required for each direction shall be placed not less than 2 in. nor more
than one-third the thickness of wall from exterior surface.
(b) The other layer, consisting of the balance of required reinforcement in that direction,
shall be placed not less than 3/4 in. nor more than one-third the thickness of wall from
interior surface
 (c) Vertical and horizontal reinforcement shall not be spaced farther apart than three
times the wall thickness, nor 18 in.
(d) Vertical reinforcement need not be enclosed by lateral ties if vertical reinforcement
area is not greater than 0.01 times gross concrete area, or where vertical reinforcement
is not required as compression reinforcement.
(e) In addition to the minimum reinforcement required by 14.3.1, not less than two No.5
bars shall be provided around all window and door openings. Such bars shall be
extended to develop the bar beyond the corners of the openings but not less than 24 in

Precast Infill System

A precast system can be constructed rapidly without the need for extensive formwork and the
relatively cumbersome and sometime difficult procedures associated with moving and placing
large quantities of fresh concrete within an existing building. The precast panels can be brought
into an existing structure through the use of elevators and light forklifts. The panels have shear
keys along the sides to allow for force transfer and are connected to one another through the use
of a reinforced grout strip. Panels are connected to the existing frame through the use of steel
pipes (shear lugs) that eliminate the need for interface dowels. The existing structure is cored in
selected locations to allow for insertion of pipes and continuity of the wall vertical reinforcement.

Out-of-plane resistance of the wall system is achieved through the combination of continuous
vertical reinforcement in the grout strips, shear resistance of the steel pipes, and the constraint
provided by the boundary elements that provides for in-plane compression under bending. The
components contributing to out-of-plane resistance are shown in Figure 2

The tensile capacity of the existing frame columns must be increased to provide overturning
capacity to the infill wall. Many existing structures were constructed with only compression lap
splices which do not provide for tensile yielding of column reinforcement. A post-tensioning
system located adjacent to the existing frame columns (boundary elements) is used to improve the
column tensile capacity without using conventional jacketing.

Figure 2 Out of plan adopted from (FROSCH R 2006)

Figure 3 Precast Infill System adopted from (FROSCH R 2006)

Conclusion

Worldwide experience clearly indicates that the masonry infill walls may have significant effect
on the collapse of buildings and loss of life depending on the nature of the earthquake level,
geology, building size, shape and irregularities.

The stability and integrity of reinforced concrete frames are disadvantaged with masonry infill
walls. Presence of masonry infill wall also alters displacements and base shear of the frame.
Irregular distributions of masonry infill walls in elevation can result in unacceptably elastic
displacement in the soft story frame or soft stories can be formed due to premature failure of
masonry infills at any level of framed structures.

According to reported earthquake damage studies, the reinforced concrete frames with masonry
infills present a high level of damage. Under these conditions, the references quoted question the
appropriate building authorities on why the reinforced concrete framed

References
Doangn, A., et al. (2008). Seismic performance of masonry buildings during recent
earthquakes in Turkey. The 14thWorld Conference on Earthquake Engineering October.

FROSCH, R. (2006). "Seismic Rehabilitation using Infill Wall Systems." Advances in

Earthquake Engineering for Urban Risk Reduction: 395-409.

Tasligedik, A., et al. (2011). "Damage Mitigation Strategies of Non-StructuralInfill Walls:

Concept and Numerical-Experimental Validation Program."