Acoustic emission characteristics of fracture modes in masonry materials

Acoustic emission (AE) is a powerful technique for detection and analysis of the elastic waves produced by the failure mechanisms in construction materials such as masonry. In this study, the different fracture mechanisms are studied in relation to the properties of bricks and mortars. The fracture process is being evaluated using the combination of AE and Digital Image Correlations (DIC) techniques. The isolation of the AE signatures of different types of failure mechanisms is done by testing bricks in flexure and brickwork couplets in compression. AE data are analyzed with a simplified AE parameter-based approach aiming to characterize the fracture mode. This is one of the first times where the relation between the shear and the longitudinal strain field is correlated in masonry with AE. This offers new insight in the material's behavior especially in relation to complicated structural geometries where the dominant stress mode is not known a priori.