## 1 Introduction  
As one of the most popular materials, the concrete block is widely used in the world for its low cost and high bearing capacity. With blocks serving as formwork for grout concrete during construction, masonry structures have the advantages of reducing construction cost and improving construction efficiency. Additionally, reinforced masonry shear walls (RMSWs) exhibit better seismic performance compared to traditional unreinforced masonry structures due to the existence of horizontal and vertical reinforcement, which results in RMSWs being widely applied in mid-rise and high-rise buildings [1]. Despite these advantages, it should be noted that traditional RMSWs still have some shortcomings. With respect to traditional construction technology, blocks in the bottom layer of RMSWs must have cleaning holes (see Figure 1a) for the cleaning of redundant mortar occurring during construction and the following vertical reinforcement connection, which not only causes additional construction procedures and inconvenience of fabrication but also results in reduced integrity and weakened structural performance of masonry structures. In addition, lap splices are commonly applied for the connection of vertical rebars in traditional RMSWs of limited construction space at the cleaning holes. The concentration of lap splices at the bottom layer is not encouraged in structural specifications [2; 3]. An innovative application of the precast technique in reinforced masonry shear walls can help to solve these problems. The construction of the newly-developed precast RMSW starts first with the fabrication of hollow masonry shear walls in the factory. Second, the hollow walls are fastened and transported to the construction site. Lastly, the fastened hollow wall is lifted up and laid down on the floor. Meanwhile the aligned vertical steel bars fixed on the floor pass through the block cores, as shown in Figure 1b. After that, the hollow masonry walls are fully grouted with special concrete. In the above construction procedure, original cleaning-hole blocks can be eliminated since the precast technology enables workers to clean redundant mortar and connect vertical steel bars more easily, which leads to the improvement of construction efficiency and structural integrity. In the literature, lots of theoretical, experimental, and numerical investigations have been conducted to evaluate the seismic performance of the traditional RMSW and the parameters that influence the inelastic behavior of the RMSW, which include the axial compressive stress, the horizontal and vertical reinforcement, and the aspect ratio [4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9]. The flexural and shear failure are the two typical failure modes of RMSW under earthquake conditions [10]. The shear failure is characterized by diagonal cracking. It is generally agreed that this type of failure should be avoided for its relatively brittle behavior [11; 12; 13]. By contrast, flexural failure, which is characterized by compression crushing of the corner and the tensile yielding of vertical steel bars, is the favored failure mode. Research has shown that the RMSW failed in the flexure exhibited good inelastic deformation and energy dissipation capacity [14; 15; 16]. However, few studies have been conducted on precast reinforced masonry shear walls. It could be expected that the seismic performance of precast RMSWs is comparable to traditional RMSWs. The precast RMSWs have the potential of being applied in buildings in seismic areas. Therefore, in this study, a research program was conducted to investigate the seismic performance of newly-developed precast reinforced masonry shear walls. Two traditional and two precast RMSWs were designed and failure-tested under lateral cyclic loading. The failure mode, hysteretic curves, stiffness degradation, displacement ductility, and energy dissipation capability of the test walls were evaluated. This paper aims to promote theoretical research on the seismic performance of the precast RMSW.