FURTADO, ANDRÉ1,A; COSTA, CATARINA1,B; RODRIGUES, HUGO2; ARÊDE, ANTÓNIO1,C

1Departamento de Engenharia Civil, Faculdade de Engenharia, Universidade do Porto, Aafurtado@fe.up.pt, Bcatarinaqmcosta@gmail.com Caarede@fe.up.pt

2ESTG – Instituto Politécnico de Leiria, hugo.f.rodrigues@ipleiria.pt

Recent earthquakes have shown that the vulnerability of some RC buildings with masonry infill walls is high when submitted to seismic actions. The safety of this type of buildings is important and any detailed information about this type of structures is essential to mitigate losses that future earthquakes are likely to induce.

The present study focuses on the observation and analysis of architectural and structural design drawings of 80 buildings that represent common RC buildings with masonry infill walls, built in different periods. The data was analysed with the purpose of estimating geometric properties of the masonry infill panels confined by RC frames. These have been divided in different typologies according to the different disposition of openings. All measurements were determined in order to have a deeper knowledge about the percentage of openings that exists in masonry infill walls and consequently in the building’s façade. Infill panels’ dimensions were also determined and other parameters related to the general characteristics of the buildings and the structural elements were also analysed.

Keywords: Portuguese building stock, RC buildings, infill masonry, geometric characterization