Cyclic Behavior of Multiple-Stiffness Hardening Precast Concrete Shear Walls

Precast Concrete (PC) shear walls are becoming popular in building structures. With “wet” connection techniques, PC shear walls often behave like conventional cast-in-place walls, where stiffness hardening occurs after yielding. In this study, two PC shear walls assembled by the “dry” connection technique, and one cast-in-place shear wall, were tested by means of quasi-static cyclic loading. The main purpose of the experiment was to systematically investigate the cyclic response of PC shear walls with varying types of vertical connection in the form of a friction-bearing device. The results showed that vertical bearing in devices, which mainly stems from the longitudinal elongation of PC wall panels, could enlarge the axial force of end column so that it provided an additional resistance moment. The PC shear wall with weak connection achieved ductile failure and second ascending branches on load-displacement relationship, i.e., secondary stiffness hardening, and the wall with strong vertical connection performed great moment capacity as well as tertiary hardening. Compared to cast-in-place walls, the peak load and cumulative hysteretic energy of PC shear walls increased by about 60% and 100%, respectively. A conceptual analysis of the multiple stiffness hardening phenomenon is presented based on experimental results.

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