Comparisons of Measured and Predicted Pavement Strain in Full-Scale Accelerated Pavement Testing

Abstract

In this paper, the measured and predicted responses between a full-scale accelerated pavement test facility and that from a three-dimensional (3D) finite element model were compared using the measured 3D tire contact stresses. The objective was to predict pavement response in asphalt mixture layers using the measured 3D tire contact stresses and compare with the measured transverse strains in August and November. To carry out this objective, the transverse strains within asphalt layers were measured and the corresponding strains were predicted by 3D finite element analysis. Additionally, a layered elastic analysis, the BISAR program, was used to predict the corresponding field measurements. The predicted transverse strains by 3D finite element analysis were matched reasonably with the measured strains.

Keywords

• accelerated pavement testing
• tire contact stress
• finite element model (fem)
• pavement response