Abstract
AbstractMasonry is one of the oldest or maybe the oldest building material of all. Starting with a very short historical review, the paper gives some remarks on the basic mechanical and material behaviour of the discontinuous, nonlinear behaviour of masonry as a jointed block structure. It is important to keep in mind that there is a big difference in masonry on different sides of the Atlantic.Basic principles and statements dealing with the compressive (uniaxial, biaxial) and shear strength are derived. Typical failures and repairs are discussed. Taking into account the complex structure and the large variety with respect to block sizes, block qualities, mortars, bond forces and the overall geometry, the designer is forced to use alternative modelling techniques to the finite element method (FEM).One alternative is the distinct element method (DEM), which allows large rotations of the blocks and large deformations, e.g. separations in and of the joints. This method is well established for analysing rock masses, but, as is demonstrated in this paper, it is also well suited to investigate masonry failure mechanisms. The discontinuous non‐homogeneous behaviour of masonry can be modelled very well, and the results can be favourably compared with real cracking behaviour.
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