Numerical Investigation of the In-Plane seismic Performance of Unstrengthened and TRM-Strengthened Rammed Earth Walls

The large availability of raw earth around the World led to its extensive use as a building material through history. Thus, earthen materials integrate several historical monuments, but their main use was to build living and working environments for billions of people. On the other hand, past earthquakes revealed their inadequate seismic behavior, which is a matter of concern as a significant percentage of earthen buildings are located in regions with medium to high seismic hazard. Nevertheless, their seismic behavior and the development of efficient strengthening solutions are topics that are not yet sufficiently investigated in the literature. In this context, this study investigates numerically the in-plane seismic behavior of a rammed earth component by means of advanced nonlinear finite element modeling, which included performing nonlinear static (pushover) and nonlinear dynamic analyses. Moreover, the strengthening effectiveness of a low-cost textile-reinforced mortar on such component was also evaluated. The strengthening was observed to increase the load and displacement capacities, to preserve the integrity for higher lateral load levels and to postpone failure without adding significant mass to the system. Furthermore, the pushover analysis was shown to predict reliably the capacities of the models with respect to the incremental dynamic analysis.