Experimental study on seismic performance of steel-connection precast shear walls with earthquake-damage reparability

To enhance the seismic performance of prefabricated shear walls and realize structural reparability after earthquake-induced damage， a repairable steel-connection precast shear wall （RS-PSW） is proposed. It could be achieved that the damage to the structure is concentrated on the steel connection by replacing the vulnerable bottom area of shear walls with steel-connection area.The function of reparability is implemented by replacing damaged steel-connection members after earthquakes. The ordinary concrete shear wall （SW0）， specimen RS-PSW1（initial loaded）， and specimen RS-PSW2（loaded after seismic damage） are subjected to low circumferential reciprocal loading tests to compare and analyze the failure modes， hysteretic behavior， stiffness and bearing capacity degradation， energy dissipation and seismic damage reparability of RS-PSW. The results show that compared with SW0， RS-PSW1 exhibits a sharp reduction of cracks in the upper precast concrete wall when the displacement angle reached 1.43%， and the deformation is concentrated in the steel-connection area. Compared with SW0， the bearing capacity and stiffness of repaired specimen RS-PSW2 have slightly decreased， but the ductility and energy dissipation have greatly improved， the failure displacement angle of RS-PSW2 reaches 2.67%， which is 66.7% higher than SW0. It indicates that RS-PSW2 presents a better deformation capacity. The seismic performance indexes of specimen RS-PSW2 under reloading are basically the same as those under initial loadign， which verifies that RS-PSW can realize the repairable function of earthquake-induced damage， and the seismic performance of the structure can be quickly restored by replacing the damaged steel connectors.