Out-of-plane flexural behavior of unreinforced red brick walls strengthened with FRP composites

This paper presents the results of a study focused on evaluating the out-of-plane flexural behavior of two fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) composite systems for strengthening unreinforced red brick masonry walls. The full-scale tests followed the International Code Council Evaluation Service (ICC-ES) AC 125 procedure. In the experimental program, a total of four full-scale destructive tests were conducted on UMR red brick walls. One wall specimen was used as control (as-built) specimen without composites, and the remaining three wall specimens were strengthened with either E-glass/epoxy or carbon/epoxy composite systems with different fiber architecture. The effect of applying a cross-ply laminate on the ultimate failure mode has been investigated. Full-scale experimental results confirmed the effectiveness of the FRP composite strengthening systems in upgrading the out-of-plane flexural structural performance of URM walls. In addition, an analytical model was developed to predict the ultimate load capacity of the retrofitted walls. The analytical modeling is based on deformation compatibility and force equilibrium using simple section analysis procedure. A good agreement between the experimental and theoretical results was obtained.