Shear performance of vertical joints with different lapping splices for precast concrete frame–shear wall structures

Abstract

AbstractPrecast concrete structures have been widely applied in the construction industry worldwide. However, the current construction method for the reinforced concrete frame–shear wall structure (FSWS) is semi‐precast because the shear wall is commonly cast‐in‐place. This paper proposes a full precast FSWS and investigates three new vertical joints with different lap splices that can facilitate on‐site construction. Push‐off tests are conducted to investigate the shear performance on the aspect of cracking and failure patterns, the evolution of deformation, stiffness reduction, and energy dissipation. A finite element model with delicate consideration of the contact is developed and validated against experimental data. A further parametric study is conducted. This study shows that the lap splice with a more uniformly distributed reinforcement layout yields the crack distribution more uniformly and increases the ductility of the joints. The proposed three vertical joints exhibit an improvement in ductility compared to the monolithic one. Furthermore, the shear keys change the failure mechanism of the precast joints into the multi‐struts failure mechanism thus increasing the shear strength. The parametric study shows that the decreasing of the splice lap length could increase the shear capacity of the vertical joints but decreases the ductility. However, the ductility reduction depends on the variation of lap splices.