Damage detection of concrete masonry structures by enhancing deformation measurement using DIC

This study focuses on deformability and damage detection of a concrete masonry wall. It employed point-to-point traditional strain gages and full-field measurement technique using digital image correlation (DIC) to investigate the damage and deformability of a partially grouted (PG) reinforced masonry wall. A set of ungrouted and grouted assemblages and full-scale concrete masonry shear wall were constructed and tested under displacement control loading. The wall was constructed according with masonry standards joint committee (MSJC 2013) and tested under constant vertical compression load and horizontal lateral load using quasi-static displacement procedure. The DIC method was used to determine non-uniform strain contours on the assemblages. This method was verified by comparing strains along the selected directions with traditional TML gage results. After a successful comparison, the method was used to investigate the state of damage and deformability of the wall specimen. Panel deformation, crack pattern, displacement at the top, and the base strain of the wall were captured using full-field measurement and results were in a good agreement with traditional strain gages. It is concluded that full-filed measurements using DIC is promising especially when the test specimens experience inelastic deformation and high degree of damage. The ability to characterize and anticipate failure mechanisms of concrete masonry systems by depicting strain distribution, categorizing structural cracks and investigating their effects on the behavior of the wall were also shown using DIC. In addition to monitoring strains across the gage length, the DIC method provided full-field strain behavior of the test specimens and revealed strain hotspots at locations that corresponded to failure.