CHAPTER: 1 INTRODUCTION:-
1.1 GENERAL
A vertical plate like RC wall in reinforced concrete building, called SHEAR WALL. Walls of the building are continuous throughout the height and generally start at foundation level. Shear walls acts a vertical oriented wide beams which carry earthquake loads downward to the foundation. Shear walls are provided along both length & width of building. Their thickness can be as minimum as 150mm or as maximum as 400mm in high rise building. Most RC building has columns with shear walls. These columns & shear walls carry lateral loads & gravity load respectively. Shear walls provide high strength & stiffness to building in the direction of their orientation, which significantly reduces damage to structure and its contents and thereby reduces lateral sway of the building.
Shear wall buildings are usually regular in elevation and in plan. Lower floors of some building are being used for commercial use and the buildings are characterized with larger plan dimensions at those floors. There are setbacks at larger…show more content… When shear wall is not introduced in such building, the size of beams and columns is larger and difficulty arises at these joint and it causes the concrete to place and vibrate at these places and it causes the larger displacement, and greater forces are introduced in the building member. According to point of view of economy, shear walls are essential. In the horizontal force resisting system, shear walls are the elements of the horizontal force resisting system. The effects of lateral load acting on a structure can be countered by introducing shear walls. Shear walls are straight external walls that typically form a box which provides all of the lateral support for the building in residential construction. When shear walls are constructed and designed properly, and to resist the horizontal forces they will have the strength and