The masonry arch as a four‐link mechanism under base motion

Abstract The dynamic response of an unreinforced masonry arch is examined, modelling the rigid body motions of arch segments under the influence of gravitational and inertial forces. This extends earlier studies of single rocking blocks, stacked blocks, and portal mechanisms of blocks; the masonry arch is analysed as another kinematic form of such a system. In this first effort a part‐circular planar arch ring is studied and excitation is restricted to horizontal ground acceleration of the base. The mechanism kinematics are presented and the governing equation of motion is derived in non‐linear form. The instantaneous form is determined for small rotations about the initial geometry and is used to study the conditions for the onset of mechanism motion. Possible failure conditions are posed and bounding principles are stated. One possible failure condition, direct overturning as a four‐link mechanism, is studied for one simplified base motion. The results show that an arch geometry establishes good resistance to earthquake excitation in that ground acceleration must exceed a rather high threshold before any mechanism motion would develop; however, once that threshold has been passed the arch has relatively modest resistance before failure. Other possible failure conditions are discussed; one emerges from pounding effects between segments at impact, and another develops from sliding of blocks over one another as the internal forces (normal and tangential to the masonry joint) vary with the inertial forces.