Single lap shear tests of masonry curved pillars externally strengthened by CFRP strips

The paper presents an experimental study concerning the bond behaviour of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymers (CFRP) sheet reinforcements applied to curved masonry surfaces. Such strengthening technique is more and more used in structural rehabilitation and retrofitting of existing buildings. Its effectiveness has been demonstrated by several studies published in the literature, mostly devoted to flat bonded surfaces. Observing that CFRPs are extensively applied on arches and vaults but only few research activities concern curved bonded surfaces, the experimental study described in this paper is aimed to contribute to fill this gap. The experimental program was carried out on portions of masonry arches, reinforced by CFRP sheets bonded at extrados or intrados, tested by a single lap shear test. The experimental results allowed to analyse the effectiveness of such reinforcements, loaded by actions tangent to an end of the reinforcement itself, with respect to its position (intrados or extrados) and to the curvature of the bonding surface. As expected, the results highlight that the bond behaviour strongly depend on the position of the reinforcement. In particular, the capacity of reinforcements bonded at the extrados increases with the curvature, while decreases with the curvature for those bonded at intrados.