Seismic capacity of masonry groin vaults through upper bound limit analysis

A sensitivity analysis on the seismic capacity of masonry groin vaults, the simplest form of cross vault, is described in this paper. The main objectives of this study were: 1) assessing the effects and the influence of the main geometrical and mechanical properties, 2) proposing an analytical formulation for evaluating the seismic capacity of groin vaults (as a guidance to engineers and practitioners). In particular, the influence of the diameter, thickness, angle of embrace, infill and tensile strength, was investigated. On the other hand, the interaction with the rest of the structure was accounted only choosing two different boundary conditions. The analysis has been performed through a non-commercial software based on the upper bound approach of standard limit analysis. The results gave grounds for multiple linear regression analyses in order to get analytical equations for quick seismic evaluation of existing groin vaults.