An expeditious approach for analysis of masonry towers under seismic loads

The structural assessment of existing masonry towers under exceptional loads, such as earthquake loads, requires reliable and expedite methods of analysis. These approaches should take into account both the randomness that affect the masonry material properties (in some cases the distribution of elastic parameters too) and the specific non-linear behavior (f.i. the small tensile strength) of the material. Considering the need of simplified but effective methods to assess the seismic response of slender masonry tower, the paper aims to propose an expeditious approach for seismic assessment of masonry towers assuming the material properties as a stochastic field. As a prototype of masonry towers a cantilever beam is analyzed assuming that the first modal shape governs the structural motion. With this hypothesis a non-linear hysteretic Bouc & Wen model is employed to reproduce the system response which is eventually linearized to evaluate its bounds. The results of the simplified approach are compared with the results of FE model to shows the effectiveness of the method.