CHARACTERISATION OF PAVEMENT MATERIALS USING REPEATED LOAD TESTS

Abstract

An important part of the development of structural design approach to the design of pavements is adequate characterisation of the constituent materials in the context of the part they play in pavement structure.' This characterisation can take the form of determining the elastic constants and failure criteria so that elastic theories may be used to compute critical stresses and strains. The acceptibility of these may be assessed in terms of the anticipated life of the pavement. In addition to the stress-strain characteristics of the materials used in the various layers of the _pavement structure, information is required on the likely mode of failure of the various materials under repeated loads. This information can be used to set the design criteria in the form of maximum allowable stresses or strains to be used in the design. In order to characterise the pavement materials their testing for loading and environmental conditions which they are likely to be subjected as pavement component is essenm tial. Since the pavement material experiences repeated cycles of load/stress due to moving vehicles, the testing of the same under repeated loading would simulate the field conditions.........