Joint faulting behaviour of innovative short concrete slabs

Pradena, Mauricio; Houben, L.J.M.

doi:10.1680/jmuen.17.00012

Joint faulting behaviour of innovative short concrete slabs

Title

Joint faulting behaviour of innovative short concrete slabs

Author

Pradena, Mauricio (University of Concepcion)
Houben, L.J.M. (TU Delft Pavement Engineering)

Date

2019

Abstract

Pavements are one of the largest assets of a city and their functional condition (ride quality) is priority for their clients. In jointed plain concrete pavements (JPCPs), the presence of joint faulting (JF) reduces the ride quality. Today, short slabs are available as a cost-effective JPCP innovation. The objective of this paper is to analyse the JF behaviour of JPCPs with short slabs. For this, a deterioration model to predict it and trends of JF observed in short slabs of Chile and the United States are considered. The HDM-4 model always yields lower JF per joint in short slabs than in traditional ones. However, real-world short slabs show not only lower JF per joint (that the modelled JF), but also that more joints do not necessarily mean more JF per length of pavement that affect the ride quality. One of the relevant explanatory factors for it is the radical reduction of crack width at joints, which produces a fundamental increase of the load transfer efficiency. To maintain favourable behaviour observed in the field it is recommended to assure joint activation and to provide adequate stiffness of the layers below the short slabs.

Subject

Highways
Municipal
Pavement design
Public service engineering
Roads

To reference this document use:

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:19fe83c4-a4ee-4602-9c6d-2c374b917459

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1680/jmuen.17.00012

Embargo date

2019-08-23

ISSN

0965-0903

Source

Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Municipal Engineer, 172 (3), 157-163