Numerical and experimental behaviour of a full-scale RC structure upgraded with steel and aluminium shear panels

In current paper the problem of seismic upgrading of existing reinforced concrete structures by means of metal shear panels is examined. Firstly, according to both a preliminarily experimental–numerical evaluation of the bare RC structure performance and analytical relationships, an ideal steel panel configuration has been defined and secondly refined FEM models have been implemented in order to check the reliability of the proposed design procedure. Finally, based on the achieved numerical results, the effectiveness of the applied devices has been proved by full-scale experimental tests, which confirmed in both cases the significant improvement of the original building features.