Seismic performance of confined prestressed hollow core wall panels Part I: Experiment

Abstract

Concrete prefabrication techniques have been popularized and utilized in building construction industry for years. To further improve the construction efficiency and quality for low-rise buildings, a confined prestressed hollow core wall system is proposed. The new system employs the standardized prestressed hollow cores that are commonly used for floors to be vertical structural elements to resist gravity and lateral loads. The panels are confined by a precast constructional frame that is composed of precast concrete ring beams and tie columns to improve its ductility and strength. A series of experimental tests were conducted to study the axial and in-plane/out-of-plane lateral behaviors of the new proposed system. The test included 19 specimens with various parameters of geometric properties, prestressing forces and binding details between panels and constructional frames. The experimental results showed that prestressed hollow core walls experienced shear-flexural behaviors at small lateral drifts and were controlled by a braced-frame deformation mode at large drifts with opening and splitting of horizontal and vertical joints between panels and frames. The confining frames were able to significantly increase the structural ductility, prevent hollow core units from collapse as well as maintain a considerable post-cracking load bearing capacity. The ultimate lateral drift of prestressed hollow core walls generally exceeded 1%–2%, and thus the structural system was preliminarily proved feasible for engineering practice. Numerical simulation and analysis of the proposed system is discussed in Part II of this study.