NUMERICAL PREDICTION OF THE RESPONSE OF A SQUAT SHEAR WALL SUBJECTED TO MONOTONIC LOADING THROUGH PARC_CL MODEL

The paper adopts the FEM to describe the behaviour of a squat shear wall subjected to monotonic loading conditions. Nonlinear finite element analyses (NLFEA) have been performed with the model, denoted as PARC_CL, implemented at the University of Parma in the user’s subroutine UMAT.for for the ABAQUS Code. The PARC_CL model, suitable for loadingunloading- reloading conditions, is an evolution of the PARC model. The new model provides a more accurate response prediction for reinforced concrete structures subjected to monotonic loading, but characterized by internal stress redistribution and/or cracks opening and closing phenomena. The PARC_CL model has been adopted to simulate the response of a squat shear wall whose experimental results have been presented at the last Concrack2 Benchmark Workshop. The obtained results have been compared with the results of NLFEA carried out with DIANA code in order to focus on the main differences detected in the structural response of a shear-critical structure analyzed with a standard code or with a crack model tailored on shear critical structure analyses. Finally the design shear capacity of the wall has been determined analytically and with PARC_CL and DIANA models applying the safety format methods for NLFEA.