Description
In the Metropolitan area of Recife (RMR) there was an increase of masonry buildings in the 1960s, witch past time with the process that led to the production of a typology of in residential buildings of up to four floors that are locally known locally as "prédio-caixão", was widely used. This building constructed with "non-load bearing masonry" that consists of hollow ceramic bricks, or concrete blocks, with a thickness of 9 cm, seated side by side with horizontal holes. Since the 1970´ structural masonry began to be treated as an engineering technology in Brazil, through the use of structural project based on scientifically validated principles. The structural masonry is built in concrete or ceramic block, which uses industrialized pieces according to ABNT standards, join by mortar, making the set monolithic. This constructive process has as one of the characteristics the inflexibility of modification of the masonry, that is, the walls should not be demolished or opened in any ways, except for what is already established on project, or else it could cause risk of compromising the stability of the construction. This dissertation aims to analyze the impacts caused by openings in walls, in the light of the arch effect, in four-story buildings of “non-load bearing” and structural masonry, if a structure of the building to have Reinforced concrete band or not, when this opening is made in a wall located on the ground floor , and was not planned in a project. For structural analysis, computational models based on the Finite Element Method (FEM) were used, validated through analytical calculations. The application of the studied model makes it possible analyzes structural problems caused by the openings, allowing to know the behavior of the building structure. It is also possible to predict the extension of the impact of this modification in the whole structure, besides allowing us to know to what extent the building could withstand the tensions state due to the change in the path of the loads caused by the removal of part of the masonry, without collapsing. In this study, it was verified that the buildings in “non-load bearing” masonry without Reinforced Concrete band as the size of the opening increased, showed less stability and probability of collapse.
