Experimental tests for the seismic response evaluation of cold-formed steel shear walls sheathed with nailed gypsum-based panels

The European project named "Energy Efficient LIghtweight-Sustainable-SAfe-Steel Construction" (Project acronym: ELISSA) is devoted to the development and demonstration of cold-formed steel (CFS) modular systems. In particular, these systems are nano-enhanced prefabricated lightweight steel skeleton/dry wall construction with improved thermal, vibration/seismic and fire performance, resulting from the inherent thermal, damping and fire spread prevention properties. The different building performances are studied and improved by means of experimental and numerical activities organized on three scale levels: micro-scale, meso-scale and macro-scale. In particular, the evaluation of the seismic performance is carried out at the University of Naples by means tests on connections (micro), seismic-resistant systems (meso) and full-scale two stories house prototype (macro). From a structural point of view, the system is a sheathed-braced CFS solution, in which the seismic resistant elements are made of CFS stud shear walls laterally braced by gypsum-based panels. In the adopted solution, the sheathing panels are attached to the CFS frame by means of ballistic nails, whereas clinching points are used for steel-to-steel connections. The present paper illustrates the results of meso-scale tests performed on four full scale shear walls, in which the influence of the aspect ratio, the type of loading and the effect of finishing was investigated.