Experimental and Numerical Studies on the Shear-Sliding Behavior of Clay Brick Masonries

The identification of the shear strength parameters of masonry can be carried out through different experimental techniques, aimed at reproducing typical failure modes of masonry structural elements. The objective of this work is to characterize the shear-sliding behavior of brick masonry through the execution of triplet tests on three different masonry typologies. Series of triplet tests (EN 1052-3) were performed in displacement control on standard samples, constituted of clay bricks and lime-based mortar, arranged in a stacked bond. The experimental results were analyzed and compared among the different masonry typologies trying to correlate the shear strength parameters to the mechanical properties of the materials. Numerical simulations of the experimental tests were also carried out, adopting a simplified micro-modeling approach. The nonlinear numerical analyses allowed to properly interpret the experimental outcomes and they were compared with them in terms of failure load, post-peak behavior and specimen deformability, obtaining a good agreement.