Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257

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Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Strengthening of unreinforced masonry using welded wire mesh

and micro-concrete – Behaviour under in-plane action
Sachin B. Kadam a, Yogendra Singh a,⇑, Bing Li b
a
Department of Earthquake Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee 247667, India
b
School of Civil and Environment Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore

h i g h l i g h t s

 Efficacy of a commonly used strengthening method for masonry buildings examined.

 Review of earlier studies on in-plane behavior of strengthened masonry presented.
 The presented technique is attractive, due to its low cost and ease in application.
 Increase up to 7 times in shear strength, and up to 24 times in ductility of URM.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Unreinforced masonry (URM) buildings constitute a significant part of existing building inventory world-
Received 2 May 2013 wide. Past earthquakes have shown that these buildings are highly vulnerable to earthquakes. Applica-
Received in revised form 28 November 2013 tion of of Ferro-cement (welded wire mesh with micro-concrete/mortar) is one of the commonly used
Accepted 16 December 2013
techniques for seismic retrofitting of such buildings. The present experimental study performed on unre-
Available online 17 January 2014
inforced brick masonry panels strengthened by Welded Wire Mesh (WWM) and micro-concrete, aims to
investigate the efficacy of this technique in enhancing the shear and ductility capacity of masonry. A set
Keywords:
of six unreinforced and twelve strengthened panels are subjected to diagonal compression tests. Two dif-
Unreinforced brick masonry
Shear strength
ferent reinforcement configurations, simulating field application, are evaluated. The effect of strengthen-
Ductility ing on in-plane shear behaviour of URM walls, including failure modes, modulus of rigidity, shear
In-plan behaviour strength, maximum drift, and pseudo ductility, are investigated. The results show that the strengthening
Retrofit using Ferro-cement results in significant enhancement in shear strength and ductility of unreinforced
Ferro-cement masonry.
Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction plane bending action due to extremely low tensile strength of

Unreinforced masonry (URM) is among the most commonly
used building materials in India and many other developing coun-
tries. Most URM buildings are built with little or no consideration
for seismic loading, and these are not capable of resisting the ex-
pected seismic actions. The major share of the loss of human lives
and property during past earthquakes, has been attributed to
poorly constructed URM buildings. In spite of significant develop-
ments in earthquake engineering during the past decades, the
URM buildings continue to be the major cause of human and eco-
nomic losses during earthquakes, as observed during Bhuj (2001)
[1], Kashmir (2005) [2] and Ankara (2007) [3] earthquakes. During
earthquake, the masonry walls are subjected to both in-plane as
well as out-of-plane action. URM walls are very weak in out-of-
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 1332 285534; fax: +91 1332 276899.
E-mail addresses: yogendra.eq@gmail.com, yogenfeq@iitr.ernet.in (Y. Singh).
the mortar-brick interface and resist the lateral load primary in
in-plane action. However, the door and window openings in the
walls, are sources of weakness in in-plane action of walls. Openings
result in reduction of effective cross-sectional area of walls resist-
ing lateral loads. The piers between door and window openings are
the most critical components resisting in-plane forces. These are
subjected to much higher stresses than the portions of the wall
above and below the openings. Depending on the critical action,
piers may fail in sliding shear, diagonal cracking, toe crushing or
rocking failure modes [4]. Masonry has pre-defined planes of
weakness along the bed joints. In case of low-rise buildings with
low normal (vertical) stress on bed joints, sliding is the main mode
of failure, as the masonry mobilizes the resistance against sliding
failure primarily through friction in the bed joints. The wall piers
having higher vertical load, may fail in diagonal shear resulting
from the combination of the vertical and lateral loads. The cracks
follow the plane of principal stresses that exceed the in-plane

0950-0618/$ - see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2013.12.033
248 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257
tensile strength of masonry. X-shaped cracks due to cyclic diagonal
shear are commonly observed in short piers. In case of slender
piers, failure may occur due to rocking, which is characterized by
horizontal cracks at the pier and spandrel junctions and/or crush-
ing of masonry at the pier toe. As compared to rocking and sliding
failures, the diagonal shear cracking is a brittle mode of failure.
Several techniques are available to improve the seismic perfor-
mance of existing URM walls. These include Stitching and Grout/
Epoxy injection, re-pointing, Bamboo reinforcement, post-tension-
ing using scrapped rubber tyres and other materials, various types
of mesh reinforcements, and some of the advanced materials like
Fibre-reinforced Polymers (FRP) and Engineered Cementitious
Composites (ECC), which are efficient though costly [5]. For ma-
sonry retrofit, FRP is used in the form of either externally bonded
(EB) or near surface mounting (NSM). A number of studies with dif-
ferent FRP orientations, sizes of wallettes, and testing methods are
reported in the literature [6–15]. These studies have shown that
the FRP retrofit can enhance shear strength of URM wallettes, sig-
nificantly. Some of the experimental studies [16–18] show that the
NSM technique results in higher strength of masonry as compared
to EB application. In this technique FRP is inserted into grooves cut
into the masonry. This technique is effective for larger stresses and
retains the original appearance of the structure. Another method
by which FRP can be used for masonry strengthening is structural
repointing (SR) where the FRP is inserted into mortar joints [19].
External application of overlays such as ECC [20] and Steel Rein-
forced Grout (SRG) [21] has also been explored as a retrofit solu-
tion for masonry wallettes. ECC is a type of strain-hardening
cement-synthetic fibre composite that is directly sprayed onto
URM walls. Strain hardening property is imparted in ECC through
formation of micro-cracks. The study [20] shows that use of ECC
is effective when it is used to resist in-plane stresses but additional
reinforcement is needed for resisting out of plane stresses. In SRG,
high strength steel cords are embedded in cementitious matrix to
form a composite. The technique is effective in enhancing strength
of masonry panels, but it needs further research about size of steel
cords and bond of cords with the cementitious matrix and
masonry.
Strengthening of masonry walls using externally bonded or
near surface embedded steel strips, bars, wires, or welded wire
mesh (WWM) is an economical and simple method [21–23] of ret-
rofit of URM buildings. These techniques are much cheaper as com-
pared to FRP and ECC systems and result in comparable
enhancement in masonry strength. Some experimental studies
have been performed using twisted steel bars as near surface rein-
forcement for seismic strengthening of masonry panels [22]. The
main issue in use of twisted steel bars as reinforcement is their
bond with the masonry and the failure is mostly governed by slip
of the bars. In comparison with steel bars and strips, welded wire
mesh provides better bond with the masonry. In Pakistan, low rise
damaged unreinforced block masonry buildings were strengthened
using cement grouting and welded steel wire mesh with rich ce-
ment mortar [24]. The method proved to be effective and the
experimental results showed that the retrofitted building could
survive ground shaking up to 0.50 g. Strengthening by Ferro-ce-
ment overlay on unreinforced and confined brick masonry walls
was studied [25] by conducting quasi-static load test on scaled
brick masonry walls. The study concluded that retrofitting was
able to enhance the lateral load capacity of the unreinforced ma-
sonry wall significantly, however it was only marginally beneficial
in case of confined masonry walls. The same retrofit technique
along with grout injection was implemented on a full scale URM
building which was damaged up to strength degradation of 30%
under cyclic load test [26]. The study showed that lateral load car-
rying capacity was significantly improved and damage mechanism
was transformed from mixed compression-flexural-shear mode to
a more stable flexural rocking mode. Textile Reinforced Mortar
(TRM) is another promising technique for masonry retrofit which
combines the advantages of both ‘conventional’ and ‘modern’ tech-
niques [27]. In this technique, a grid (textile) of fibres is bonded to
the surface of masonry using specially developed moratrs. The grid
form of the fibres has similarity with the WWM and results in good
bond with the masonry. The technique is currently under develop-
ment to identify the optimum amount of fibres and composition of
mortar.
Diagonal compression test is a commonly used method to
investigate in-plane strength of masonry walls. Table 1 presents
a summary of some of the major available studies on in-plane
behaviour of URM walls strengthened using different techniques.
The studies summarised in Table 1 show that it is possible to en-
hance the in-plane strength of URM panels significantly (almost
up to 4 times), using different strengthening techniques. Increase
in shear strength is governed by retrofit system adopted and the
application method. In most of the cases, diagonal shear and local
crushing are the governing failure modes. For specimens retrofit-
ted with FRP, loss of bond is another prominent failure mode.
Reduction in shear strength is also observed in a few cases of exter-
nally bonded FRP retrofit system. However, this reduction is attrib-
uted to improper application of the retrofit system [6,7].
In the present paper, experimental investigation of in-plane
behaviour and efficacy of a strengthening technique using Welded
Wire Mesh (WWM) and Micro-concrete has been presented.
Although, it is a commonly used seismic retrofit technique in India
and Indian standard IS13935:2009 [30] provides the details of
application of this technique, comprehensive experimental studies
demonstrating efficacy of this technique are not available. In the
present study, diagonal compression test according to ASTM
E519/E519M-10 [31] has been used to investigate the in-plane
capacities of URM and strengthened masonry panels, and relative
increase in strength and ductility has been estimated.
2. Strengthening of URM buildings using Ferro-cement
A common method of seismic strengthening of URM buildings
in India is use of horizontal and vertical strips (known as bandages
and splints, respectively) of Ferro-cement on both sides of walls.
The horizontal ‘bandages’ are applied continuously on all the walls
at lintel, sill, floor, and roof levels, whereas the vertical ‘splints’ are
applied at corners and junctions of walls and along the jambs of the
openings. Fig. 1 shows the typical arrangement of splints and ban-
dages in a retrofitted URM building. The Ferro-cement strips con-
sisting of welded wire-mesh (WWM) reinforcement embedded in
cement-sand mortar or micro-concrete have a composite action
with the URM resulting in significantly enhanced strength and
ductility in shear, rocking and out-of-plane bending. The bandages
provide the support to the walls in out-of-plane action, whereas
the splints enhance the shear and rocking behaviour of the piers.
The Ferro-cement strips are applied using two alternative proce-
dures. In the first procedure, a 10 mm thick layer of rich cement-
sand (1:4) mortar is first applied on the masonry surface after re-
moval of existing plaster and applying a bond coat of polymer
modified cement slurry. The surface of the mortar layer is kept
rough for proper bonding with the next layer.
The required reinforcement in the form of WWM is then applied
over the mortar layer on both sides of the walls, interconnected by
4 mm wires provided across the walls in holes drilled at regular
intervals. After placing and interconnecting the wire-mesh on the
two faces of the wall, a bonding coat of polymer modified cement
slurry and second layer of cement-sand mortar (15 mm thick) is
applied (Fig. 2). In an alternative procedure, the wire-mesh is
placed directly over masonry surface without applying mortar
 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257 249

Table 1
Summary of diagonal compression tests on retrofitted URM specimens, available in literature.

Reference Specimen properties Retrofit system

Material Size (mm) W c Material Application h F % Increase in Failure
Strength mode
Marshall et al. [6] Block/hollow brick 1220  1220 1,2 45 FRP-G/C/GVA EB fabric/grid 0/90 1 (-30)-40 DS/LC
Tumialan et al. [19] Block 1626  1626 1 0 FRP- G GFRP Bar in Mortar 0 NA 30–80 S/LC
Valluzzi et al. [7] Solid brick 510  510 1 45 FRP-G/C/PVA EB fabric 45/0/ 1 and 2 (-10)-74 DS
90
Stratford et al. [8] Block/Solid brick 1200  1200 1 0 FRP- G EB fabric 90 1 38–65 DS/LOB
Santa-Maria et al. [9] Hollow brick 1060  1100 1 0 FRP- C EB plate/fabric 0/45 1 and 2 0–70 DS/LC/S
Ciro faella et al. [10] Tuff Stone 1200  1150 2 45 FRP- C EB fabric 90 1 and 2 0–130 LOB
Hamid et al. [11] Block NM 1 45 FRP- G EB fabric 0 /90 2 6358 LC
Li et al. [28] Block 1625  1625 1 0 FRP- G NSM bar/plate 90 1 and 2 28–123 DS/S
Gabor et al. [12] Hollow bricks 870  840 1 45 FRP-RFV/RFC/ EB fabric 45/90 2 42–62 DS/LC
RFW
Turco et al. [16] Block 1600  1600 1 0 FRP- G NSM bar 0 1 and 2 70–123 DS/S
Silva et al. [13] Block/grouted 1626  1219 1 0 FRP- G EB polyurea 0/90 1 and 2 21–99 DS/S
brick bonded grid
Petersen et al. [17] Solid brick 1200  1200 1 45 FRP- C NSM Rectangular 0/90 1 and 2 1–46 DS/S
Strip
Lin et al. [20] Solid brick 1200  1200 2 45 Shotcrete-ECC EB Spray NA 2 NM DS/LOB
Borri et al. [21] Sandblasted brick 515  510 1 45 Steel-SRG EB strips 90 1 and 2 36–377 DS/S
Luccioni and Rougier Solid brick 580  610 45 FRP- C EB fabric 0/45/ 2 50–100 S/LC
[14] 560  550 90
Mahmood and Solid brick 1170  1170 1,2 45 FRP- C/G EB fabric NSM bar/ 90 1 and 2 36–325 DS/LOB
Ingham [18] plate
Ismail et al. [22] Solid brick 1200  1200 1,2 45 Steel-TSNSM NSM bar 90/0 1 and 2 73–189 DS/S
Kalali and Kabir [15] Solid brick 560  560 2 45 FRP- G EB fabric/grid 45/0/ 2 145–331 DS/LC/S
90
Churilov and Solid brick 1460  1820 2 0 RC Jackets Steel Mesh in 0/90 2 146–205 DS/S/LC/
Dumova- 2520  1820 Concrete BVR
Jovanoska [23]
Zhou et al. [29] Solid brick 2100  1200 2 0 BFRP EB fabric/CS Grout 45/0 2 44–61 DS/S /LOB

Where: Block = concrete block; W = wythes; c = angle in degrees during test between wall bed joints and loading axis; F = faces of wall; FRP = fiber reinforced polymer;
G = glass; C = carbon; GVA = glass vinyl ester; PVA = polyvinyl alcohol; EB = externally bonded; NSM = near-surface mounted; h = angle in degrees between FRP fiber/steel
reinforcement and wall bed joints; RFV = uni-directional glass fiber; RFC = uni-directional carbon fiber; RFW = bi-directional glass fiber; NA = not applicable; NM = not
mentioned; DS = diagonal shear; S = sliding; LC = local cracking; LOB = Loss of bond; SRG = steel reinforced grout; TSNSM = twisted stainless steel near surface mounted;
BVR = bending of vertical reinforcement; CS Grout = cement- water glass grout.

Fig. 1. Retrofitting of a masonry building using Ferro-cement splints and bandage.

layer, but with a gap of about 10 mm from the masonry surface
using precast concrete ‘spacers’. Then micro-concrete of 25 mm
thickness is sprayed (Fig. 3) using pneumatic pressure (the process
is known as ‘Shotcreting’ or ‘Gunnitting’), after interconnecting the
wire-mesh on the two sides of walls using 4 mm dia. wires and
applying a bond coat of polymer modified cement slurry. The tech-
nique was recently used for the retrofit of 6 school buildings in
Indian Himalayas, under a collaborative project between Indian
Institute of Technology Roorkee, India and Nanyang Technological
University, Singapore. The number of reinforcing wires in the wire-
mesh, along with the size and interval of connecting wires, is
Fig. 2. Application of Ferro-cement splint and bandage – second layer of plaster
being applied over the welded wire mesh which was placed on the first layer of
plaster.
estimated using the basic principles of structural mechanics [32].
Design tables for quick design of retrofit in different zones of India
are also available in the Indian standard IS13935:2009 [30]. An
analytical and experimental study is being undertaken to assess
the efficacy of the performed retrofitting and for estimating the
expected performance of the retrofitted buildings. Estimation of
the mechanical properties of the strengthened masonry is the first
step in developing an analytical model. This paper presents the
study on in-plane behaviour of the strengthened masonry. A simi-
250 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257
Fig. 3. Micro-concrete being sprayed over welded wire mesh by gunnitting
(shotcrete) operation.
lar study on out-of-plane behaviour of URM panels retrofitted with
Ferro-cement is also being conducted and presented elsewhere.
3. Experimental program
A testing program was undertaken to investigate the in-plane capacity of URM
wallettes and enhancement in their shear capacity and ductility after strengthening
using WWM and micro-concrete. Six as-built and twelve strengthened URM wal-
lettes were tested under diagonal compression (in-plane shear). The wires in the
wire-mesh were oriented perpendicular and parallel to the masonry bed joints.
As seen in Figs. 2 and 3, in actual practice, the wires are continuous in vertical direc-
tion (perpendicular to bed joints) in the splints and in the horizontal direction (par-
allel to bed joints) in the bandages. To simulate the bond of continuously applied
wire-mesh with the masonry, the wires were bent on the sides of the wallettes,
as shown in Figs. 4 and 5. Two cases were considered in the present study. In the
first case, both the sets of orthogonal wires were anchored by bending at sides,
whereas in the second case, only the wires perpendicular to the bed joints were an-
chored and the wires parallel to the bed joints were simply cut at the edges of the
wallettes, simulating the condition in splints. The WWM on the two faces of wal-
lettes was also inter-connected using four 4 mm wires provided through the ma-
sonry, as in the actual retrofit process. The failure modes, strength, and load–
displacement behaviour of wallettes were studied, subjecting them to diagonal
compressive load.
3.1. Material properties
The resulting strength of masonry panel depends on the properties of constitu-
ent materials viz. bricks, mortar and WWM. Two types of masonry wallettes were
constructed to replicate the construction practice in Indian masonry buildings. In
Fig. 4. Specimen geometry and details of anchorage of WWM in different sets.
India, two-wythe walls are generally used for load bearing URM construction,
whereas for the internal partitions, one-wythe walls are also used, in some cases.
Accordingly, the test wallettes were constructed using new bricks of size
230 mm  110 mm  70 mm, in two thicknesses 110 mm (single wythe) and
230 mm (two wythes). These bricks were bonded together by means of 10 mm
thick mortar joints, which consisted of one part of cement and six parts of sand,
by volume, as used in practice. English bond with alternate header and stretcher
courses was used in case of two wythe thick wallettes, whereas running bond
was used in case of single wythe thick wallettes. Compressive strength tests were
conducted on mortar, bricks, and masonry according to the relevant ASTM stan-
dards. Mortar compressive strength was determined by performing tests on
50 mm mortar cubes in accordance with ASTM C109/C109M -11[33] and the com-
pressive strength of bricks and masonry were determined in accordance with ASTM
C67-11[34] and ASTM C1314-11[35], respectively. The tensile strength and elastic
modulus of wires in the WWM, was determined as per ASTM A370 -11 [36]. The
numbers of specimens tested of bricks; mortar cubes, masonry, and WWM were
10, 6, 8 and 12, respectively. The results of the tests on constituent materials are
presented in Table 2. From the results, it is observed that the compressive strength
of masonry prisms was higher than the compressive strength of mortar cubes but
much lower than the compressive strength of bricks, representing the common con-
struction practice using strong bricks and weak mortar [37]. The welded wire mesh
material has high tensile strength but very low modulus of elasticity, as compared
to mild steel. Similar observation about WWM was also made by other researchers
[23]. Further, there is significant variability in the strength of masonry (COV  20%)
and WWM (COV  14%). The wire mesh used in the present study is sold as
10 Gauge thick [30] in the local market, whereas, the actually measured diameter
of wires (Table 2) is much lower than the standard Gauge 10 (diameter 3.25 mm).
3.2. Test wallettes
The experimental program consisted of in-plane shear testing of six sets of
unretrofitted and retrofitted wallettes, and three samples in each set were tested.
The sample sets – S1 and S2 consisted of single-wythe and two-wythes thick panels,
respectively, of URM representing as-built conditions, whereas the specimens in
sets S3–S6 were strengthened prior to testing, using different configuration of
WWM and a constant (25 mm) thickness of micro-concrete as shown in Fig. 4.
WWM of gauge 10 thickness with 35 mm square grid spacing was used. In speci-
mens of sets S3 and S5, the WWM wires were anchored uni-directionally, whereas
in specimens of sets S4 and S6 the wires were anchored bi-directionally. In the
specimens with uni-directionally anchored WWM, wires perpendicular to bed
joints were anchored by bending at the edge, whereas the wires parallel to bed
joints were cut at the edge, as shown in side view of sets S3 and S5 in Fig. 4. On
the other hand, in case of the specimens with bi-directionally anchored WWM,
the wires in both the directions were bent along the sides as shown in side view
of sets S4 and S6 in Fig. 4. The test specimens of sets S1 and S2 are denoted as UDSP
(Unreinforced Diagonal Shear Panel) whereas the sets S3–S6 are denoted as RFDSP
(Retrofitted Ferro-cement Diagonal Shear Panel). Specimen dimensions and details
of the retrofit application are shown in Table 3. Fig. 5 shows the steps in strength-
ening process. The application process used in the present study is slightly different
than the actual field application shown in Figs. 2 and 3. To reduce the variability in
 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257 251

Fig. 5. Steps in strengthening of wallettes.

application and to achieve the desired accuracy in specimen shape and dimensions,
the micro-concrete in the laboratory application was applied using a wooden mould
(Fig. 5).
As seen in Figs. 2–4 mm thick steel rods at a spacing of about 400 mm are used
in field for tying together the WWM on the two faces of the wall.
These rods pass through the holes drilled in the masonry wall and transfer the
shear at the WWM-masonry interface, through dowel action. Similar dowels (4 Nos.
of 4 mm dia steel rods) were also used in the experimental study to connect the
WWM on the two faces of the wallettes with the masonry, as shown in Fig. 4.
The dowel rods were provided through the masonry wallettes and bent over the
WWM on the two faces.
3.3. Testing procedure
ASTM E519/E519M-10 [31] standard guidelines were used to investigate the in-
plane diagonal shear strength of unretrofitted and retrofitted specimens. The diag-
onal compression load was applied on the opposite corners of the panels using a
250 T capacity INSTRON closed loop UTM. The experimental setup for the diagonal
compression test is shown in Fig. 6. Displacement controlled diagonal loading was
applied to the panel through a set of steel shoes placed at top and bottom of the
specimen. The rate of loading was kept 0.1 mm/min for unreinforced wallettes
and 0.3 mm/min for retrofitted wallettes, so that the test is completed approxi-
mately within 2 Min [31] .
All the specimens were transported to the testing frame using overhead crane
facility available in the laboratory. Care was taken to avoid any damage to the spec-
imens in process of transportation, particularly in case of URM specimens, which
are quite fragile due to low tensile strength of masonry. For this purpose, the spec-
imens were transported in vertical position avoiding out-of-plane bending. The dis-
placements of panel diagonals in compression and in tension were measured on a
gauge length of 380 mm in the middle of specimen by two diagonally placed linear
variable differential transducers (LVDTs) attached on opposite sides of the specimen
(Fig. 6). The LVDTs were directly attached to specimen using screw and clamp
arrangement and connected to the same data acquisition system used for measure-
ment of applied load, facilitating synchronised measurement of load and
deformations.
4. Results and discussion
Testing of all the specimens was continued until the strength
degraded to one third of the peak strength. The shear stress-strain
curves were obtained from the recorded loads and deformations.
To correlate with the observed behaviour of the strengthened wal-
lettes, the reinforcement ratios in the orthogonal directions were
calculated as
nAs lh nAs lv
qh ¼ ; qv ¼ ð1Þ
LHt LHt
where n is number of wires in the given direction; As is cross sec-
tional area of one wire of welded wire mesh; lh and lv are lengths
of wires in horizontal and vertical directions, respectively; and L,
H, and t are length, height, and thickness, respectively, of the wal-
lettes. The failure pattern, strength and ductility of the unreinforced
and strengthened masonry wallettes are compared in the following
Sections.
4.1. Behaviour of URM and retrofitted wallettes
The observed failure of URM specimens (Fig. 7) can be consid-
ered as a combination of diagonal and sliding shear failure. These
wallettes failed in a sudden brittle manner, by formation of cracks
252 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257

Table 2 or de-bonding of the WWM reinforcement was observed in case

Material properties.
fb (N/mm2) fc (N/mm2)
Masonry materials
Mean value 21.07 2.45
COV (%) 16.63 22.22
ft (N/mm2) Es  103 (N/mm2)
Welded wire mesh
Mean value 850.81 127.23
COV (%) 13.82 12.24
fb = compressive strength of brick; fc = cube compressive strength of mortar;
fm = compressive strength of masonry; ft = tensile yield strength of welded wire
mesh; Es = elastic modulus of welded wire mesh; Ds = net diameter of one wire of
welded wire mesh.
along the loaded diagonal. The failure was more brittle in one-
wythe thick specimens, where the total collapse of specimen
immediately followed the formation of a toothed crack as shown
in Fig. 7a. As soon as the first crack developed, the specimen was
not able to sustain any further force. The failure of two-wythe thick
specimen was extended for slightly larger strains as compared to
one-wythe thick specimen due to interlocking of bricks in English
bond, as shown in Fig. 7d.
The behaviour of retrofitted wallettes was governed by the
thickness of wallettes, reinforcement ratio and anchorage (uni-
directionally or bi-directionally) of WWM. For wallettes with
uni-directionally anchored WWM reinforcement, failure was initi-
ated by cracks along the edges of the specimens (Fig. 7b and e),
indicating slip between the masonry and the WWM. At larger dis-
placements, there was some local crushing of the micro-concrete
near the edges and consequent de-bonding of the wires. The final
failure took place as combination of sliding shear and diagonal
tension as shown in Fig. 8a.
For wallettes with bi-directionally anchored reinforcement, the
failure initiated in the form of diagonal cracks, which were distrib-
uted within middle one third of the horizontal diagonal of the wal-
lette, as shown in Fig. 7c and f. These diagonal cracks developed
into major cracks at the later stage, and local crushing of masonry
along with micro-concrete took place near the loading and sup-
porting shoes. Contrary to the specimens with uni-directionally
anchored WWM, the edges remained intact. Further, no slippage
of bi-directionally anchored reinforcement.
fm (N/mm2) As mentioned earlier, in the actual field application, the in-
plane strength of masonry piers is enhanced using splints (vertical
3.72 strips of Ferro-cement), whereas bandages (horizontal strips of
19.46
Ferro-cement) are used to enhance the out-of plane performance
Ds (mm) of masonry walls. In splints, the wires perpendicular to bed-joints
2.42
are continuous, whereas the wires along the bed joints are cur-
4.38 tailed at the splint edges. Therefore, the specimens with uni-direc-
tionally anchored WWM are closer to the reality in field
application. However, the present study demonstrates that the
cracked masonry restrained with WWM reinforcement, in case of
bi-directional as well as uni-directional anchorage, developed
shear induced dilation mechanism resulting in increased load
and displacement capacity. Further, as shown in the next section,
the relative enhancement in the strength and ductility in the two
cases, is of the same order.
4.2. Shear stress-drift response
The response of URM and retrofitted wallettes is considered in
terms of average shear stress (s) vs. drift (d). The average shear
stress is obtained from the experimentally measured diagonal
force P [31] as
0:707P
s¼ ð2Þ
0:5tðL þ HÞ
where t is wallette thickness, and L and H are the length and height,
respectively of the wallette.
This drift (d) is equal to shear strain (c) and is calculated [31] as
DV þ DH
d¼c¼ ð3Þ
g
where DV is the diagonal shortening along the axis of applied force
(i.e. along the vertical diagonal), DH is the diagonal elongation mea-
sured perpendicular to the axis of applied force (i.e. along the hor-
izontal diagonal), and g is the gauge length (kept same for both the
directions).
The behaviour of unreinforced and strengthened wallettes, in
terms of shear stress-strain (drift) curves, is shown in Fig. 9.
URM wallettes exhibited sudden strength degradation, once crack-

Table 3
Specimen dimensions and details of retrofit application.

Set Specimen Dimensions (mm) Retrofit details

H L t
UDSP -1
S1 UDSP -2 700 700 110 One-wythe thick URM panel
UDSP -3
UDSP -4
S2 UDSP -5 700 700 230 Two-wythe thick URM panel
UDSP -6
RFDSP-7
S3 RFDSP-8 750 750 280 Two-wythe thick masonry panel with uni-directionally anchored WWM
RFDSP-9
RFDSP-10
S4 RFDSP-11 750 750 280 Two-wythe thick masonry panel with bi-directionally anchored WWM
RFDPS-12
RFDSP-13
S5 RFDSP-14 750 750 160 One-wythe thick masonry panel with uni-directionally anchored WWM
RFDSP-15
RFDSP-16
S6 RFDSP-17 750 750 160 One-wythe thick masonry panel with bi-directionally anchored WWM
RFDSP-18

Where: H = wallet height; L = wallet length; t = wallet thickness; WWM = welded wire mesh.
 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257 253

Fig. 6. Test set-up and loading steel shoes fabricated for the diagonal compression test.

Fig. 7. Photographs showing typical crack patterns of URM and strengthened wallettes.

ing had propagated. Failure of one-wythe thick masonry panel is
very brittle as shown in Fig. 9a. Due to better interlocking of bricks,
the maximum drift ratio (Fig 9b) in case of double wythe wallettes,
is almost double of that in case of one-wythe thick masonry wal-
lettes. The behaviour of all the strengthened wallettes was approx-
imately linear (Fig. 9c–f) up to onset of cracking, and then there
was a gradual decrease in shear stress with increase in drift ratio,
except for
RFDSP-10 which had a sudden failure by development of a ma-
jor crack on one side, possibly due to eccentricity in loading or sud-
254 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257
Fig. 8. Photographs showing crack patterns in specimens with differently anchored WWM, under increasing diagonal compression.
den de-bonding of WWM. It is noted that response of one-wythe
thick wallettes strengthened using bi-directionally as well as uni-
directionally anchored WWM, was more ductile as compared to
two-wythe thick wallettes, and the post yield stress-strain curve
was almost horizontal up to a drift of 2.5%. The shear strength of
these wallettes was also higher as compared to the corresponding
two-wythe thick wallettes with similar strengthening (Table 4).
This is due to the higher reinforcement ratio in case of single-
wythe thick walls. As the same WWM is used for strengthening
of all the specimens, it results in higher reinforcement ratio in case
of thinner (one-wythe thick) walls, as shown in Table 4.
4.3. Stiffness, strength, and ductility
The shear stiffness of all the wallettes is represented by an
effective modulus of rigidity (G), which is determined as the secant
modulus between 0.05smax and 0.75smax of the shear stress–strain
curves [22]. It is observed that the response of all the specimens is
nonlinear and the post-peak behaviour in case of strengthened
wallettes is characterised by very gradual strain softening. This
behaviour makes it difficult to identify the yield and ultimate
points. To compare the inelastic behaviour of the tested specimens,
the actual behaviour has been idealized by an elastic-perfectly
plastic bilinear behaviour [38], where the slope of the elastic seg-
ment (G) is obtained, as described above, ultimate drift (du) is
determined as the drift at which the shear strength reduces to
0.8 times the maximum shear strength (smax) and the yield drift
(dy) is determined from the intersection of the elastic and plastic
segments of the equivalent bi-linear curve (Fig. 10), such that the
area under the bilinear curve is the same as that under the exper-
imental curve [18,39]. The ductility ratio (l), is then estimated as
du
l¼ ð4Þ
dy
Table 4 shows the values of effective modulus of rigidity,
strength and ductility of the tested specimens. The increase in
the strength due to retrofitting using WWM is expressed in terms
of ratio (s/s0) of strength of retrofitted wallettes to the correspond-
ing URM wallettes. It is observed from the Table that all the four
sets of strengthened specimens resulted in significant (4.9–
7 times) increase in shear strength. The maximum increase in
shear strength was achieved in case of one-wythe thick masonry
panels with bi-directionally anchored WWM.
The strengthening using WWM with micro concrete also re-
sulted up to 24 times increase in ductility. Similar to strength,
the increase in ductility of one-wythe thick wallettes (Sets S5
and S6) was also much higher as compared to the corresponding
two-wythe thick wallettes. As in case of strength, this can also be
attributed to the higher reinforcement ratio in case of one-wythe
thick wallettes.
Another interesting observation is that despite different modes
of initiation of failure, the anchorage of WWM does not have signif-
icant effect on the strength and ductility. This is possibly due to the
good mechanical bond provided by the dowels used to connect the
WWM on the two faces of the wallettes. This has avoided slip of
the reinforcement in the central portion of the specimens, resulting
in similar stress-strain behaviour in the two (uni-directional and
bi-directional anchorage) cases.
 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257 255

Fig. 9. Shear stress- drift plots of URM and retrofitted wallettes.

5. Conclusions failure mode, resulting in crushing of micro-concrete and de-bond-

In-plane shear behaviour of masonry wallettes with and with-
out strengthening using WWM and micro-concrete has been stud-
ied using diagonal compression tests. The results were studied in
terms of shearing rigidity, shear strength, drift capacity, and ductility.
It was observed that strengthening of URM wallettes using WWM
results in significant improvement in shear strength and ductility.
An increase up to 7 times in shear strength, and up to 24 times in
ductility has been observed for reinforcement ratio of 0.29% in both
the directions. The enhancement in the capacity of the strength-
ened wallettes has been observed to be primarily governed by
the reinforcement ratio, resulting in higher shear strength and duc-
tility in case on one-wythe thick wallettes as compared to the cor-
responding two-wythe thick wallettes. The anchorage of WWM at
the specimen boundaries has some effect on the initiation of the
ing of wires at the specimen boundaries, however it does not have
a significant effect on the capacity enhancement. In fact the
strength of one of the two-wythe thick specimens with bi-direc-
tionally anchored WWM is lower than the corresponding uni-
directionally anchored specimens. This is due to large variation
in the strength of the constituent materials as reported in Table 2.
The almost equal strength of the specimens retrofitted using uni-
directionally and bi-directionally anchored WWM can be mainly
attributed to the mechanical bond provided by the dowels used
to inter-connect the WWM on the two faces of the specimens.
The experimental study demonstrates that the applied retrofit
technique using WWM and micro-concrete results in significant
enhancement in in-plane capacity of the URM walls. Further, the
relative increase in the shear strength due to strengthening, ob-
served in the present study, is much higher as compared to the
256 S.B. Kadam et al. / Construction and Building Materials 54 (2014) 247–257

Table 4
Test results.

Set Wallette qh (%) qv (%) Pmax (kN) smax (N/mm2) s/s0 Avg s/s0 dy (%) du (%) l G  103 (N/mm2)
UDSP -1 0.00 0.00 24.65 0.22 – 0.06 0.06 1 0.31
S1 UDSP -2 0.00 0.00 25.54 0.22 – 0.04 0.04 1 0.33
UDSP -3 0.00 0.00 24.19 0.21 – 0.04 0.04 1 0.36
UDSP -4 0.00 0.00 44.00 0.19 – 0.12 1.15 1 0.23
S2 UDSP -5 0.00 0.00 50.13 0.22 – 0.16 0.16 1 0.23
UDSP -6 0.00 0.00 42.48 0.19 – 0.18 0.18 1 0.20
RFDSP-7 0.14 0.14 211.92 0.93 4.65 0.86 2.75 3 0.93
S3 RFDSP-8 0.14 0.14 258.44 1.13 5.65 5.17 0.10 1.11 11 1.35
RFDSP-9 0.14 0.14 237.33 1.04 5.20 0.20 1.28 6 1.02
S4 RFDSP-10 0.14 0.14 175.36 0.77 3.85 0.11 1.62 15 2.43
RFDSP-11 0.14 0.14 249.76 1.12 5.60 4.93 0.15 1.71 11 2.55
RFDSP-12 0.14 0.14 244.94 1.07 5.35 0.16 1.32 8 2.19
RFDSP-13 0.29 0.29 147.96 1.30 6.00 0.31 2.48 8 1.41
S5 RFDSP-14 0.29 0.29 169.80 1.49 6.87 6.63 0.13 3.08 24 1.17
RFDSP-15 0.29 0.29 173.61 1.52 7.01 0.13 2.12 17 1.93
RFDSP-16 0.29 0.29 187.28 1.64 7.57 0.23 2.61 11 2.68
S6 RFDSP-17 0.29 0.29 141.96 1.25 5.77 7.06 0.11 2.55 24 1.19
RFDSP-18 0.29 0.29 193.42 1.70 7.85 0.28 3.33 12 1.81

qh = horizontal reinforcement ratio; qv = vertical reinforcement ratio; Pmax = maximum applied diagonal force; smax = maximum shear stress; dy = % drift at yield; du = %
ultimate drift (corresponding to 0.8s); l = ductility; G = modulus of rigidity; s/so = ratio of the shear strength of strengthened wallette to that of the URM wallette and Avg s/
so = average value of ratio of three specimens.

Fig. 10. Bilinear idealisation of experimental curve for the wallette RFDSP 18.

other procedures used in the earlier studies available in literature. References

This is mainly due to the much lower shear strength of the original
URM, typical of Indian construction. The study demonstrates that
use of WWM with micro-concrete is an effective method of
strengthening URM walls. However, a large number of tests on
wallettes with different types and mechanical properties of ma-
sonry, and varying reinforcement ratio, are required to develop a
comprehensive model for predicting enhancement in seismic
capacity of existing URM buildings retrofitted using this technique.
As earthquake causes both in-plane as well as out-of-plane forces
on walls, tests for estimating out-of-plane strength of retrofitted
walls are also required. The study is being extended for out-of-
plane behaviour of similar URM panels strengthened using
WWM and micro-concrete.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the funding support
provided by the Temasek Foundation, Singapore through Nanyang
Technological University (NTU), Singapore.
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