Abstract
Masonry towers, located in seismic zones, are vulnerable and prone to damages up to compromise their stability. The scatter of data on the mechanical properties of masonry, geometry and boundary conditions determine a lack of building knowledge on their expected behaviour. Therefore the assessment of the seismic capacity represents a critical task. This paper contributes to the issue of seismic analysis of masonry towers, focusing a meaningful case study: the St.Silvestro belfry in L’Aquila, Italy. The tower, severely damaged by the 2009 earthquake sequence, underwent extensive restoration works, endeavoured to mitigate its vulnerability. The observed seismic damage, the performed no-destructive testing campaign and the accomplished rehabilitation measures are described in the paper. The authors appraised the actual seismic performances of the St.Silvestro belfry, reinforced by the last restoration works. At first, the Operational Modal Analysis (OMA) is carried out to enhance building knowledge. In a second step, a refined finite element model is calibrated on the results from OMA to seize the actual dynamic response. Ultimately, by using the updated finite element model, the authors estimate the fragility curves in terms of peak ground acceleration using truncated incremental dynamic analyses.
Highlights
Masonry towers (MTs) are monumental constructions conceived, from ancient times, to withstand gravity loads
This paper presents the evaluation of the dynamic response of a masonry tower, the St.Silvestro belfry, located in L’Aquila, Italy, severely damaged by the 2009 earthquake
The model updating involves the solution of a constrained optimization problem related to an objective function, which is generally expressed as the difference between experimental and numerical natural frequencies and mode shapes of structures
Summary
Masonry towers (MTs) are monumental constructions conceived, from ancient times, to withstand gravity loads. The prediction of the MTs seismic response is a rather complex problem due to the uncertainties in the characterization of the masonry and the structural configuration. The empirical correlations allow the estimation of the fundamental vibration period, including only geometric features, in agreement with the experimental data collected by [22,23]. The modal characteristics, such as modal shapes and frequencies, can be experimentally identified to characterize the current conditions of a structure [24,25,26,27], which is the base for the design of the strengthening and retrofitting interventions. The fragility curves, in terms of peak ground acceleration, were obtained using the truncated incremental dynamic analysis to assess the probabilistic seismic performance of the belfry
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
