Wood Beton ARIA: a new wood-concrete structural wall: seismic performances

A series of experimental tests on full scale precast composite wooden-concrete walls were carried out at the University of Bergamo (Italy), in order to investigate the seismic performances of these structural panels. The ARIA walls are assembled with timber vertical beams which are connected to an outer concrete layer by means of deformable connections. This allows to build seismically efficient constructions, thanks to both the reduction of the seismic mass, using a lightweight material such as wood, and the bracing contribution given by the external concrete layer. The employment of the ARIA that brings together horizontal loads resistance, high insulating performances and energy efficiency during both winter and summer due to the concrete slab thermal inertia and the air gap inside the panel. Experimental tests were performed on 2 full scale wall panels assembly subjected to horizontal quasi-static reversed cyclic load with increasing amplitude up to collapse, in order to investigate post-elastic behaviour, dissipation characteristics, load bearing capacity and failure conditions. Results from these tests, along with the ones from numerical analyses and on-site tests, are presented in this paper.