Influence of crack propagation on the seismic behavior of historic rammed earth buildings: The Tower of Muhammad in the Alhambra (Spain)

The presence of defects in the form of cracks is frequent in rammed earth historic buildings located in seismic zones. The influence of these cracks, however, has not been directly taken into account in the numerical models for this kind of structures existing to date in the literature. In this light, this study presents an analysis of a FEM model of a heritage rammed earth structure - Tower of Muhammad of the Alhambra - under gravity loads and a seismic action, with and without the existing cracks, with the aim of assessing their influence. The results show that the inclusion of cracks in the model significantly influence the structural behavior of the building, changing the stress distribution and reducing its stiffness and load capacity. The model with cracks is also able to accurately show damage location in the walls due to crack propagation.