Experimental study on emulative hybrid precast concrete shear walls

Abstract

The reversed cyclic lateral loading experiments were conducted on three, full scale, emulative hybrid precast concrete shear wall specimens with different post-tensioned forces and one reference monolithic RC shear wall specimen, and the measured results were then discussed in this paper. The emulative hybrid wall combined grouted vertical reinforcements with unbonded post-tensioned high-strength multi-strand tendons for lateral resistance, attempting to emulate the cast-in-place RC wall. Because of the presence of the unbonded post-tensioned tendon, by contrast to the monolithic wall specimen, the emulative hybrid wall specimens possessed higher strength, higher stiffness, and smaller residual displacement. The opening gap, resulted from the discontinuity of concrete and the locally debonding of vertical connecting reinforcements, was limited mainly due to the vertical connecting reinforcements across the joint distributed over total cross-section. Meanwhile, the emulative hybrid wall specimens were capable of providing energy dissipation and ductility capacity comparable to that of the monolithic specimen, and the negative effect of the post-tensioned force on energy dissipation was more obvious than on ductility. Moreover, the post-tensioned tendon remained elastic throughout the test and the yielding of the connecting reinforcements was delayed.