ANALYSIS OF HEAVY DUTY FLEXIBLE PAVEMENT USING FINITE ELEMENT METHOD

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Minoufiya University

2 Mansoura University

3 Alex. University

Abstract

In recent years, decreased fatigue life, increased rutting, and accelerated serviceability loss in
flexible pavements have been attributed to the effects of increased wheel loads as well as increased
tire pressures. This effect is more significant in subtropical regions.
Thus, the main objective of this research was to evaluate flexible pavement sections under
different conditions of axle loads, tire contact pressure and pavement temperatures. Stresses,
strains and deflections of different sections were calculated using finite element method. Linear
analysis was used to calculate pavement responses of asphalt layers, while non-linear analysis was
utilized for granular layers. Moreover, fatigue life of different pavement sections was predicted.
Analysis of the results of this paper revealed that, some pavement sections have high safety criteria
for 30 years design period and consequently the thickness of asphalt layers could be reduced and
other sections are not acceptable for 30 years design period without increasing the layers thickness.
Moreover, it was concluded that the axle loads have a very significant influence on fatigue life and
rutting of flexible pavements, while the effect of increasing tire contact pressure has lower
influence. Also, it can be concluded that temperature has a very significant influence on flexible
pavement responses.

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