PERFORMANCE OF INTERLOCKING BRICK WALLS AGAINST OUT-OF-PLANE EXCITATION.

Masonry structure is one of the most commonly used building types in developing countries due to its inexpensiveness and material availability. While masonry structure is intrinsically strong in resisting gravitational force, it is relatively weak in resisting lateral forces such as an earthquake. Therefore, reinforcement for masonry structures in earthquake-prone areas is necessary. This paper introduced an interlocking brick as one of the promising reinforcement methods for masonry structure as it does not require extra material and is easy to implement. The performance of a lego-shaped interlocking brick in resisting dynamic lateral forces was investigated through 2-dimensional dynamic finite element analysis. The created lego-shaped interlocking brick wall was analyzed under the out-of-plane dynamic loading. Its performance was compared with the performance of the rectangular brick wall. The analysis results showed that the lego-shaped interlocking brick wall had better performance in resisting out-of-plane loading than the rectangular brick wall since the blocks interlock each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]