Assessment of Important Parameters for Seismic Analysis and Design of Confined Masonry Buildings: A Review

Confined masonry (CM) building is emerging as a popular building construction system in many earthquake-prone countries including India. This building type has performed really well in several destructive earthquakes, even though it started as an informal construction. A finished CM building looks like a reinforced concrete (RC) infilled structure, however, the structural behavior of both the systems is quite different. Apart from excellent performances in seismic events, it is very cost-effective and easier to construct. But the design methodology for CM buildings is yet to be standardized for Indian conditions due to lack of research. Therefore, it is important to study the various factors affecting the performance of CM building in comparison to other building types. The objective of this study is to identify the parameters influencing the seismic performance of CM buildings. The dependency of seismic response of CM buildings on different key parameters such as material and geometric properties, gravity loads, amount of longitudinal steel present in tie-columns, and aspect ratio of the wall is discussed in this paper.