Drilled Core Method for Testing Basic Mechanical Properties of The Brick Masonry Before and After Reinforcement

Abstract:

This paper proposed a novel method, which named the drilled core method, to test the basic mechanical properties of brick masonry before and after reinforcement. The method can be popularized to evaluate the effect of brick masonry reinforced by various mortar surface. An auxiliary loading device was designed to test the compressive strength and interface shear strength of core samples. Strength tests of 315 core samples and 54 standard brick masonry parts were successfully completed by using auxiliary loading device. After that, the interfacial shear strength tests under four different surface treatment conditions were completed to verify the feasibility for evaluating the interfacial shear strength after reinforcement. The compressive strength test results indicate that the compressive strength of core samples correlates strongly with the standard brick masonry parts. Before reinforcement, the correlation coefficient of compressive strength between core samples and standard brick masonry parts is suggested as 2.13 for MU7.5, 2.25 for both MU10 and MU15. After reinforcement, the correlation coefficient is suggested as 3.26 for all the masonry strength grade. The interfacial shear strength test results show that the interfacial shear strength between the strengthened surface layer and the brick masonry is less affected by mortar and block strength grade, but mainly by different treatment methods of brick masonry surface. All the test results show that, it is feasible to test the basic mechanical properties of brick masonry structure before and after reinforcement by using the proposed drilled core method for brick masonry structure.