Study on seismic performance of prestressed precast concrete walls through cyclic lateral loading test

Abstract

This paper presents experimental results from three prestressed precast concrete walls in comparison with a conventional reinforced concrete (RC) wall. The prestressed specimens utilise a combination of high-strength post-tensioned (PT) steel and mild reinforcing steel for lateral resistance, whereas the RC specimen retains a conventional code-compliant design. The major advantage of the prestressed specimens incorporating PT steel is a self-centring capability after a large lateral excursion. At the same time, PT steel facilitates construction by post-tensioning and connecting wall panels together. In this study, all the test walls had an identical overall geometry and were tested under the same reversed cyclic lateral loading. Comparisons of the seismic performance of prestressed and RC specimens were made in relation to progression of damage, failure mechanism, strength and drift capacity, energy dissipation and residual drift. The PT steel and base joint behaviours of the prestressed specimens were also recorded. Results show that the prestressed precast concrete walls feature minimal structural damage and excellent self-centring tendency compared to their RC counterpart; these features are essential to achieve a resilient structural system for use in seismic regions.