DYNAMIC JOINT LOAD TRANSFER EFFICIENCY OF RIGID PAVEMENT

Abstrac t — the mechanistic analysis presented in this paper is only the beginning of new approach for understanding the real joint load transfer capability on airport and highway concrete pavements. It gives up the two major assumptions those have been popularly adopted by hundreds of published papers: the load is transferred under a wheel with zero speed and with fixed position. The real load transfer in field is always under wheels with non-zero speed and with varied position at any moment. The objective of this study focuses on quantifying the dynamic effects of a moving wheel while it is crossing a joint on a pavement. The analysis is conducted using a model of two-slab system on Kelvin foundation under a moving wheel with variable speed v, different pavement damping C s , foundation reaction modulus k and foundation damping C k . The dynamic joint load transfer efficiency is temporarily and empirically defined by the peak strain ratio LTE(S) on the two sides of a joint. The primary findings include: (1) The higher speed of a moving wheel leads to the higher LTE(S);(2) The larger the pavement damping C s leads to the higher LTE(S);(3) The numerical ratio c(=LTE(S) dynamic / LTE(S) static ) varies in the range 1 to 2 mainly depending on speed v and damping C s ;(4) The LTE(S) dynamic is not