Fonseca, Fernando S.1 and Dillon, Patrick B.2
1 Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, 84602, USA, fonseca@byu.edu
2 Staff Engineer II, WPD & Associates Consulting Engineers, Inc., 335 Greenbrier Drive, Charlottesville, VA, 22901, pdillon@wdpa.com
ABSTRACT
Mechanical models provide a good combination of efficiency, reliability, and practicality for most masonry analysis and design scenarios. The use of stress fields, which are based on the lowerbound theorem of the theory of plasticity, has been shown to be efficient and reliable. Stress fields have been combined with the truss analogy to produce what is known as the strut-and-tie modeling procedure. This method makes it easy to visualize complicated stress paths and enables designers of reinforced quasi-brittle materials to optimize the amount and location of the reinforcement. This article presents ongoing research that has the objective to develop strut-and-tie modeling procedures for masonry. Strut-and-tie modeling can be a practical tool for designing masonry structures, but unfortunately, there are no guiding principles for implementing the method in masonry design. The presented methodology uses the existing strut-and-tie guidelines for reinforced concrete as starting point.
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