GONÇALVES, ANA MARIA1; FERREIRA, JOÃO GOMES2; GUERREIRO, LUÍS3; BRANCO, FERNANDO4

1) PhD student, Technical University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior Técnico, DECivil, goncalves.amn@gmail,com

2) Associate Professor, Technical University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior Técnico, DECivil, joao.gomes.ferreira@ist.utl.pt

3) Associate Professor, Technical University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior Técnico, DECivil, luisg@civil.ist.utl.pt

4) Full Professor, Technical University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior Técnico, DECivil, fbranco@civil.ist.utl.pt

After the 1755 large earthquake that struk Lisbon, when the city had to be rebuilt, the innovative “pombaline” buildings were developed. This type of building is characterized by its structural interior timber-framed walls in elevated floors, constituted by a timber frame with vertical and horizontal elements, braced with diagonals (Saint Andrew’s crosses) and with a masonry infill.

This paper describes an experimental campaign carried out in order to assess the in-plane cyclic behaviour of this type of timber framed wall and to evaluate the individual effect of its components, namely the timber frame and the masonry infill. Experimental characterization of the in-plane behaviour was carried out through static cyclic shear testing under controlled displacements.

Along with the experimental characterization, a finite element modelling was developed, using the ABAQUS software [10], to simulate the structural behaviour of the elements tested. Those models were calibrated based on the experimental behaviour and parametric studies were then conducted.

Keywords: timber framed walls, cyclic tests, earthquake