ABSTRACT
Most of the Reinforced Concrete (RC) buildings constructed in the second part of the last century were generally designed by neglecting the interaction between the RC frame and the masonry infill walls. A possible way for strengthening low rising RC buildings placed in low seismicity areas may be based on techniques aiming at improving the capacity of the masonry infills and exploiting the "box behavior" of the building. This chapter proposes the use of thin AR-glass fiber mesh reinforced mortar overlays for strengthening the infills located along the perimeter walls of the RC buildings. It presents the results of a series of reverse cyclic tests carried out on three full scale infilled frame walls made with horizontally perforated clay bricks, typical of non-structural elements. The proposed technique resulted able to significantly enhance both the initial stiffness and the bearing capacity of the walls compared to the reference wall.
