Compressive, shear, and tensile behaviours of concrete masonry: Experimental and numerical study

The heterogeneous behaviour of masonry structures arises from the use of materials with different mechanical properties, namely blocks, mortar, grout, and reinforcement. This complexity makes predicting the behaviour of reinforced masonry (RM) challenging. While experimental studies in the literature have focused on the ultimate compression load and strain capacities of masonry prisms, there is still a lack of experimental data on the compressive, shear and tensile behaviours of concrete masonry prisms built with different configurations. A thorough understanding of the complete compressive, shear, and tensile stress-strain curves of fully grouted and ungrouted web and C-shaped boundary element assemblages is vital for assessing the response of reinforced masonry shear walls (RMSWs) under lateral forces. Therefore, this study investigates the mechanical properties of concrete masonry assemblages under axial compression, shear, and tension experimentally and numerically. Eighty-four concrete masonry prisms were constructed either from stretcher or C-shaped masonry units, and were tested under compression, shear or tension loading. The experimental results provide full stress-strain curves, revealing that ungrouted prisms exhibit higher peak compressive stress but lower shear and tensile strengths compared to their grouted counterparts. Stretcher ungrouted prisms showed a reduction of more than 50 % in shear strength compared to their grouted counterparts. Grouted boundary element prisms demonstrated higher tensile strength and fracture energy, with increases of 40 % and 10 %, respectively, compared to the stretcher grouted prisms. Lastly, a numerical investigation was conducted to validate detailed and simplified micro-models against the experimental results, which demonstrated that the numerical results are in good agreement with the experimental outputs of this study. • Masonry behavior varies due to different properties of its constituent materials. • Study investigates axial compression, shear, and tension on masonry assemblages. • Ungrouted prisms show higher peak compressive stress but lower shear/tensile strength. • Grouted boundary element prisms have 40 % higher tensile strength than stretcher prisms. • Numerical models validated with experiments show good agreement with results.