Analysis of pavement structure sensitivity to passage of oversized heavy duty vehicle in terms of bearing capacity

[摘要] Oversized heavy duty vehicles occur in traffic very rarely but they reach extremely high weights, even up to 800 tonne. The detrimental impact of these vehicles on pavement structure is much higher than in case of commercial vehicles that comprise typical traffic, thus it is necessary to assess the sensitivity of pavement structure to passage of oversized vehicles. The paper presents results of sample calculations of load equivalency factor of a heavy duty oversized vehicle with usage of mechanistic-empirical approach. The effects of pavement thickness, type of distress (cracking or rutting) and pavement condition (new or old with structural damage) were considered in the paper. Analysis revealed that a single pass of an 800 tonne oversized vehicle is equivalent to pass of up to 377 standard 100 kN axles. Load equivalency factor calculated for thin structures is almost 3 times lower than for thick structures, however, the damage effect caused by one pass of an oversized vehicle is higher in the case of thin structure. Bearing capacity of a pavement structure may be qualified as sufficient for passage of an oversized heavy duty vehicle when the measured deflection, for example in an FWD test, does not exceed the maximum deflections derived from mechanistic-empirical analysis. The paper presents sample calculation of maximum deflections which allow to consider passage of an oversized vehicle as safe over different pavement structures. The paper provides road administration with a practical tool which helps to decide whether to issue a permit of passage for a given oversized vehicle.

[发布机构] Gdansk University of Technology, Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Highway and Transportation Engineering Department, Poland^1

[学科分类] 土木及结构工程学

[关键词] Empirical analysis;Empirical approach;Flexible pavements;Heavy duty vehicles;Maximum deflection;Pavement condition;Pavement structures;Structural damages