EXPERIMENTAL WORK FOR STRENGTH CHARACTERISTICS OF MODERN BRICK MASONRY ELEMENT USED IN HERITAGES

Abstract

Masonry have been one of the oldest and common practices in Nepal. Most of the heritages, monuments were constructed with masonry and it is still in practice for various construction purposes. Masonry is a heterogenous material as it consists of wide diversity of masonry materials, units, mortar and construction technologies. Hence study of behavior of masonry is complicated. Heritage structures made with brick masonry have sustained many large earthquakes and have performed well to resist seismic forces. It is thus important to understand their strength characteristics in order to assess how masonry respond with any type of loading given. For this, two methods have been adopted i.e., destructive tests and nondestructive tests. Destructive tests were carried out to examine the strength properties of modern brick “Ma Appa” which has been used widely after 2015 Gorkha earthquake for reconstruction of heritage sites. Study for experimental findings by testing compressive strength of unit, mortar and masonry prism along with bending, diagonal and bond strength of prisms were carried out. Nondestructive tests using rebound hammer, penetrometer and pendulum hammer were carried out to find out various properties of existing heritage structures inside Bhaktapur municipality. The results obtained were tabulated and shown in graphical form. The result shows various properties like density, modulus of elasticity, Poisson’s ratio, shear modulus. Insitu tests and their results have also been reported in this research.