Behavior and Design of Shear Connections for Loadbearing Wall Panels

D inring the past decade, use of precast loadbearing shear wall panels for high rise construction has become very popular due to the high quality control achieved at the precast concrete manufacturing plant and the ease of panel assembly and erection at the project site (Fig. 1). In the structure, the precast panels are tied together using continuity reinforcement bars and mechanical shear connectors. The gap between the panels, which is required for alignment, is normally filled with a dry pack grout. This grouting system eliminates the use of falsework and minimizes the use of temporary supports. Current design sources'3 provide only limited information about the behavior and ultimate shear carrying capacity of the connections described in this paper. The information available in the literaturelo mainly describes the shear friction mechanism and the dowel action of initially cracked concrete to concrete surfaces. The results of such studies cannot be directly applicable to the predescribed connections due to the presence of the dry pack grout layer between the two concrete surfaces.