A Composite-Reinforced Mortar (CRM) designed for the seismic strengthening of existing single or double-leaf brick masonry walls on one side only is presented and extensively tested through experiments. The benefit of the proposed strengthening method is that it does not require temporary relocation of residents. The existing single and double-leaf solid brick masonry used in the research is typical throughout Europe. The CRM coating consisted in a natural hydraulic lime mortar coating with a nominal thickness of 30 mm, reinforced with a Glass Fiber-Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) mesh applied to the wall using GFRP transverse connectors and steel injected transverse connectors for double-leaf brick masonry. Cyclic in-plane shear compression tests and out-of-plane cyclic tests were carried out on 250 mm thick full-scale masonry walls. The results demonstrated that the single-sided coating effectively enhanced the resistance, deformation capacity and dissipated energy under seismic loads, despite existing design models tending to underestimate the shear capacity to some extent.

Structural glass balustrades are usually composed of simple glass panels which are designed under various restraint solutions to minimize large out-of-plane deflections and prematurely high tensile/compressive stress peaks under lateral loads due to crowd. Linear supports, point-fixing systems, and others can be used to create geometrical schemes based on the repetition of simple modular units. Among others, linear restraints that are introduced at the base of glass panels are mechanically described in the form of ideal linear clamps for glass, in which the actual geometrical and mechanical details of real fixing components are reduced to rigid nodal boundaries. This means that, from a modelling point of view, strong simplifications are introduced for design. In real systems, however, these multiple components are used to ensure appropriate local flexibility and adequately minimize the risk of premature stress peaks in glass. The present study draws attention to one of these linear restraint solutions working as a clamp at the base of glass panels in bending. The accuracy and potential of simplified mechanical models in characterizing the effective translational and rotational stiffness contributions of its components are addressed, with the support of efficient and accurate Finite Element (FE) numerical models and experimental data from the literature for balustrades under double twin-tyre impact. Intrinsic limits are also emphasized based on parametric calculations in quasi-static and dynamic regimes.