Stochastic representation of the mechanical properties of irregular masonry structures

A procedure for the stochastic characterization of the elastic moduli of plane irregular masonry structures is presented in this paper. It works in the field of the random composite materials by considering the masonry as a mixture of stones (or bricks) and mortars. Once that the elastic properties of each constituent are known (deterministically or stochastically), the definition of the overall masonry elastic properties requires the knowledge of the random field describing the irregular geometry distribution. This last one is obtained by a software, implemented ad hoc, that, starting from a colour digital photo of the masonry and using the instruments of the digital image processing techniques, gives the random features of this field in both the space and frequency domain. The definition of the stochastic properties of masonry structures may be very useful both for the application of the stochastic homogenization techniques and for the direct stochastic analysis of the structures.