Traditional construction materials namely brick and stone masonry exhibit reasonably good resistance against compression but their weakness in tension becomes a great cause of concern. Structures, which are subjected to seismic forces, must resist tensile stresses and exhibit sufficient ductility. Hence it becomes essential to strengthen masonry members to enable them to withstand seismic forces and behave as ductile members. Ferrocement encasement of such member results in an increase in ductility and load carrying capacity. Ferrocement possesses a high degree of toughness, durability, ductility and strength. The increase in strength is attributed to increase in cross-sectional area and confinement of the masonry section by mesh. An experimental study has been carried out on different shapes of brick columns using different wire gauges i.e. 16 gauge and 18 gauge. The cement mortar used for brick masonry column was 1:4 and 1:3 for ferrocement encasement. The columns were tested under axial loading as well as under eccentric loading. From test results it was observed that the ferrocement encased columns have shown significant improvement in resisting load and there was improvement in ductility.
展开▼
