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Wang, Juan (2011) Shakedown analysis and design of flexible road pavements under moving surface loads. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.

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Abstract

Flexible road pavements often fail due to excessive rutting. as a result of cumulative vertical permanent deformation under repeated traffic loads. The currently used analytical approach to flexible pavement design evaluates the pavement life in terms of critical elastic strain at the top of the subgrade. Hence, the plastic pavement behaviour is not properly considered. Shakedown analysis can take into account the material plasticity and guarantee structure stability under repeated loads. It provides a more rational design criterion for flexible road pavements.

Finite element analyses using the Tresca and Mohr-Coulomb yield criteria are performed to examine the responses of soil half-space when subjected to different loading levels. Both shakedown and surface ratchetting phenomena are observed and the residual stresses are found to be fully-developed after a limited number of load passes. The finite element results are then used to validate the solutions from shakedown analysis.

The main focus of current research is concerned with new solutions for static (i.e. lower-bound) shakedown load limits of road pavements under both two-dimensional and three-dimensional moving surface loads. Solutions are derived by limiting the total stresses at any point (i.e. residual stresses plus loading induced elastic stresses) to satisfy the Mohr-Coulomb yield criterion. Previous analytical shakedown solution has been derived based on a residual stress field that may not satisfy equilibrium for certain cases. In this study, a rigorous lower-bound shakedown solution has been derived by imposing the equilibrium condition of residual stresses.

The newly developed shakedown solutions have been applied to one-layered and multi-layered pavements. It was found that the rigorous lower-bound solution based on the self-equilibrated residual stress field is lower than the analytical shakedown solution for cases when the critical point lies on the surface or at the base of the first pavement layer. The results showed that the theoretical predictions of pavement shakedown load limit generally agree with the finite element and experimental observations for pavement behaviours.

The shakedown solution has been further extended to study the influence of the shape of contact load area for pavements under three-dimensional Hertz loads. It was found that the shakedown load limit can be increased by changing the load contact shape from a circle area to an elliptical one. A new pavement design approach against excessive rutting has been proposed. The pavement design is suggested by plotting thickness design charts using the direct shakedown solutions and choosing the thickness combination based on the design traffic load.

Item Type:	Thesis (University of Nottingham only) (PhD)
Supervisors:	Yu, H-S.
Keywords:	Pavements, flexible, live loads
Subjects:	T Technology > TE Highway engineering. Roads and pavements
Faculties/Schools:	UK Campuses > Faculty of Engineering > Department of Civil Engineering
Item ID:	12836
Depositing User:	EP, Services
Date Deposited:	01 Oct 2012 09:29
Last Modified:	08 May 2020 10:47
URI:	https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/12836

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