INSTRUMENTATION FOR ROAD ROUGHNESS MEASUREMENT

Abstract

Roughness is the deviation of a surface from a true planar surface. No surface is perfectly smooth, even though it appears so to the naked eye and the road is no exception. Measurement of road roughness can be of interest for both civil and vehicle dynamics engineers. This dissertation work involves instrumentation of measurement of road roughness. Surface profile is obtained using a trailer unit and the power spectral density is obtained. Signals are obtained from LVDT and accelerometer fitted on the trailer unit. These signals are digitized using 8 — channel ADC module. The data thus obtained from the ADC module are transferred to PC through wireless radio modem for processing. Digital data are filtered and processed according to requirement to obtain the surface profile. Low pass and band pass filters are used. These filters are finite impulse response (FIR) type filters. The surface profile is plotted on screen. This is an online process