Brick masonry veneer walls: An overview

Masonry veneer walls have been used successfully in a wide variety of commercial, industrial, and residential structures and are common place in modern building construction in several countries. However, it is recognized that the veneer walls can be vulnerable to earthquakes and most of the reported cases of failures are due to poor materials, design and inadequate construction practices. This inadequate behaviour has promoted research on the seismic behaviour of brick veneer walls mostly attached to structural systems composed of light timber and steel frames.This paper provides an overview of brick veneer walls under seismic actions, presenting a description of the main system characteristics, namely constitutive materials and their roles, mechanical and seismic behaviour, design guidelines and construction specifications. The paper also summarizes research studies addressing different types of brick veneer walls systems (with steel, stud and concrete block backup walls), different types of analyses (experimental and numerical) and different types of loading (out-of-plane and in-plane static and dynamic).