Module -3

SYLLABUS: Flexible Pavement Failures, Maintenance and Evaluation, Types of

failures, Causes, Remedial/Maintenance measures in flexible pavements,
Functional Evaluation by Visual inspection and unevenness measurements,
Structural evaluation by Benkelman beam deflection method, Falling weight
deflectometer, GPR method. Design factors for runway pavements, Design
methods for Airfield pavement and problems on above.

General types of failure:

• Defects in the quality of material used
• Defects in construction method and quality control during construction.
• Inadequate surface or subsurface drainage in the locality resulting in
stagnation of water in the subgrade or in any of the pavement layer.
• Increase in the magnitude of wheel loads and the number of load repetitions
due to increase in traffic volume.
• Settlement of foundation of embankment of the fill material itself.
• Environmental factors including heavy rainfall, soil erosion, high water
table, snow fall, frost action etc.
• A flexible pavement failure defined by formation of pot holes’ ruts cracks
localized depression and settlements.
• The localized depression of any one component layer of the flexible
pavement structure could be enough to cause pavement failure.
• Each one of the layers should be carefully designed and laid.
• There is surface deformation when failure takes place either in subgrade or
base or surface.
Failures in Flexible pavement
• Failure in Subgrade
• Failure in Base course
• Failure in Wearing Course
Failure of Subgrade
• This is the main cause of flexible pavement failure. When there is excessive
deformation in subgrade soil, it will result in failure of whole pavement.
• The failure of subgrade soil can be detected by the following forms of
defects causing unevenness of pavement surface.
• Excessive undulation & corrugation on surface
• Depression followed by heaving at surface
• Lateral shoving of pavement near the edge along the wheel path
• The two primary reasons of failure of subgrade soil are
• -Inadequate stability
• -Excessive stress application
• Inadequate stability: Stability is the resistance to deformation under
stress. When soil used for construction of subgrade is of inferior quality, it
will not be able to resist the load coming from wheel, and ultimately it will
fail.
• Another reason causing loss of stability of subgrade soil is improper
compaction of soil during construction. Presence of excessive moisture at
subgrade level without proper drainage control also affects the stability of
subgrade.
• Excessive stress application: Thickness of the pavement should be so
designed, that it can distribute the wheel load properly.
• If pavement thickness becomes less than that of the required value, then it
will result in failure of subgrade.
• Also if the wheel load applied on pavement is in excess of design value, it
will result in failure of subgrade.
• Failure of Sub-base or Base Course
• There are 5 primary reasons behind failure of sub-base or base course as
described below.
• 1. Inadequate stability or strength: Role of a sub-base or base course is
to transform the wheel load from surface course or wearing course to the
subgrade. Therefore the strength of the sub-base or base course is always
higher than that of subgrade.
• Strength of the sub-base or base course can be achieved by taking
following measures.
• Using good quality of aggregate
• Proper mix design
• Providing sufficient thickness
• Proper quality control
• If there is any deviation occurs in any of the above mentioned factors, it
will lead to failure of pavement.
• 2. Loss of binding action: When wheel load is repeatedly applied on road
surface, it causes internal movement of particles in the sub-base or base
course. This results in relative movement between surface course and sub-
base or base course. In other word, instead of acting as whole, different
layer acts separately. This is the cause of alligator or map cracking on
bituminous surface.
• Therefore, a layer of tack coat or prime coat is applied on top of the base
course before placing surface course. This creates a better bonding of these
two layers.
• 3. Loss of base course materials: When there is no wearing course or
surface course on the base course, or if the wearing course has completely
worn out, that will result in loss of base course material. This happens
because of suction caused by the tyre and exposed base course materials.
Also loss of stone aggregate creates pot holes on surface course.
• Inadequate wearing course: If the thickness of wearing course is less,
then water will find its way to the base course causing damage to it.
• Therefore, it is essential to consider type, intensity and volume of traffic
before deciding thickness of wearing course.
• Use of inferior material: The materials to be used for construction of base
course should be so chosen in a manner so that it can resist the wheel load
and weathering actions. Inferior quality of material should not be used.
• Failure of Wearing Course
• Wearing course or surface course is the layer having more strength than all
the other pavement layers. This is because the wheel load is directly applied
on this layer. Along with the vertical load, it has also to resist the abrading
effect of wheel and weathering effect of climate.
• Therefore, design and construction of wearing course should be done
properly.
• A pervious layer of wearing course can damage all the underlying layers.
• The following measure should be employed during design and construction
of wearing courses
• Proper mix design
• Sufficient thickness
• Good quality of binder
• Proper amount of binder
• Good quality aggregate
• High degree of quality control should be employed during construction of
wearing course.
• Oxidation or aging of binder, also make the bituminous surface brittle and
creates cracks on pavement surface. This results in ingress of moisture to
underlying layers and weakening of the layers.
Maintenance of Highways
Various maintenance operations are
1. Routine Maintenance
2. Periodic maintenance
3. Special repairs
• Routine and periodic maintenance are needed for ant type of road whether
it is designed and constructed with scientific bias or not.
• The highways are exposed to moving traffic and adverse climatic
conditions.
• Even if the highways are not used, they also would need maitenance.

• Traffic is one of the many factors.

• The longitudinal and cross drains would need attention under the routine
maintenance work.
• One of the common items of maintenance work is the removal of silt,
rubbish and weeds from the longitudinal and cross drains.
• Special repairs and strengthening of pavement with overlays are needed to
prevent pavement failures.
• Special repairs of subsurface drainage system and cross drainage structures
may be needed.
• Improvements of highway geometrics.
• Routine maintenance
1.Upkeep of carriageway.
2.Maintenance of shoulders and subgrade
3.Maintenance of side drains
4. Patch repairs of pot holes and localized failures
Routine – either day to day or seasonal
• Maintenance of Flexible pavement
• 1.Patch repair
 • 2.Surface treatments
• 3.Resurfacing
Patch repairs
• Carried out on the damaged or improper road surface.
• Localized depression and pot holes may be formed in the surface layers
due to defects in materials and constructions.
• Inadequate or defective binding materials causes removal of aggregates
during monsoons.
Pot holes and repairs
• Pot holes are cut to rectangular shape and affected material in the section
are removed
• The excavated patches are cleaned and painted with bituminous binder.
• Premixed material placed. Cutback or emulsion is used as binder.
• Well compacted by ramming .
• Thickness of layers in potholes is 6cm.
• The finished level is slightly above original for compaction under traffic.
Surface treatment
• Excess of bitumen in the surface materials bleeds and the pavement
becomes patchy and slippery.
• Corrugation or rutting or shoving develop in such pavement surfaces.
• It is customary to spread blotting materials such as aggregate chips of
maximum size of about 10mm or course sand during summer.
• Necessary rolling is done to develop permanent bond between the existing
surface and the new materials.
• Applying renewal coat such as surface dressing or seal coat. If more
damage more than one layer of surface treatment.
Resurfacing
• When the pavement surface totally worn out and develops a poor riding
surface it may be more economical to provide an additional surface course
on the existing surface.
• If pavement is of inadequate thickness due to increase in traffic loads, then
overlay of adequate thickness should be designed and constructed.
Special Repairs in Flexible pavement
Waves and corrugations.
Factors:
• Defective rolling
• Poor subgrade condition
• Poor gradation or mix
• Compaction temperature
• Unstable underlying layers
Remedial Measures:
• If instability is due to excessive moisture conditions, suitable subsurface
drainage system is provided.
• If the failure is due to improper compaction of lower layers, this would
need complete reconstruction.
• If the failure is due to subgrade soil which may be highly plastic expensive
clay, the solution may be by subgrade treatment using a modifying agent
for stabilization.
• Depending upon the failure the pavement reconstruction done from
defective stage.
Pavement Evaluation
Pavement evaluation classified into 2 methods
1.Structural evaluation
2.Evaluation of pavement surface condition (Visual rating)
• Structural evaluation carried out by plate bearing test.
• Structural capacity of the pavement may be assessed by the amount of
deflection at a specified load on the plate.
• Measurement of transient deflection of pavement under design wheel loads
serves as an index of the pavement to carry traffic loads under the
prevailing conditions.
• Benkelman beam is most commonly used as the measurement are simple
and easy.
• Benkelman beam measurements are preceded by a rating survey of the road
so as to divide it into homogeneous sections of approximately similar
serviceability.
• The Benkelman beam measures the deflections under standard wheel load
condition.
• Two kinds of deflection measurements are possible.
1.Rebound deflection, which is recoverable deflection or elastic deflection. In a
well-designed road the deflection is entirely elastic and recoverable.
2.Residual deflection, which is the non-recoverable deflection. As a pavement
ages it loses a portion of its elastic properties and permanent deflection takes
place.
• Benkelman beam is a handy instrument which is most widely used for
measuring deflection of pavements.
• It consists of a lever 3.66m long pivoted 2.44m from the end carrying the
contact point which rests on the surface of the pavement.
• The deflection of the pavement surface produced by the test load is
transmitted to the other end of the beam where it is measured by a dial
gauge or recorder.
• The movement at the dial gauge end of the beam is one half of that at the
contact point end.
• The load on the dual wheel can be in the range 2.7 to 4.1 tones.
• Procedure of measuring the rebound deflection.
• Select 10points along the outer wheel path (i.e. 60cm from the pavement
edge) for each lane.
• Bring the rear dual wheel assembly of the truck over the marked point and
insert the probe of the beam between the dual wheels so that the probe is
placed exactly over the point where deflection is to be measured.
• A standard wheel load of 4085kg is used for the test, the tyre pressure being
5.6kg/cm2 (or 560kN/m2)
• The dial gauge reading is noted initially(D0) in the position.
• The truck is driven forward at a slow speed and dial gauge readings D1 and
D2 are taken when the truck stops at 2.7m and 9m from the measuring point
and when the rate of recovery is equal to 0.25mm per minute or less.
• Pavement temperature is recorded.
 • If D1-D2≤0.025mm, the actual rebound deflection is 2(D0-D2). If however
D1-D2>0.025mm, correction is needed for vertical movement of the front
legs.
• The true deflection is obtained by the formula
• XT=XA+2.91Y
• XT = True pavement deflection
• XA = Apparent pavement deflection
• Y= Vertical movement of the front legs i.e., twice the difference between
the final and intermediate dial readings.
Visual rating Method

Visual rating Method

Falling Weight Deflectometer

• It drops a weight of 150kg from a variable height on to spring system.

• This in turn transmits a load pulse of 28 ms duration to the road surface
through a circular plate.
• Maximum peak load of 60kN develops a deflected dish that can be
recorded by up to five velocity sensitive transducers arrayed radially from
the loaded area.
• The equipment is carried on single axle trailer.
• About 200 measurements can be taken daily.
Airport Pavement
Requirements of airport pavement are,
• Ability to withstand heavy loads of aircraft and high tyre pressure.
• Ability to withstand load repetitions
• Aircraft pavement interaction
• Skid resistant surface
• Effect of jet Blast
• Least maintenance Option
• Effect of Fuel and Oil spillage
Configuration of runways
 1. Single runway the simplest type
2. Parallel runways which add to the capacity of single runways
3. Intersecting runways used where strong winds blow in more than one
direction necessitating two runways intersecting at an angle.
4. Open V runways aligned in different directions each runway being used as
the wind condition dictate.
Runway Orientation
1. Orientation of a runway is selected after a careful analysis of wind velocity,
direction and duration over the past years.
2. The crosswinds component may prevent the safe usage of a runway. So the
alignment is so selected that the crosswind components are minimised.
3. Orientation is decided on the basis of past data on the occurance of winds
of various velocities and direction

Airport pavement Design

• Airport pavement design is essentially an attempt to relate the aircrafts
wheel load to the subgrade soil support value.
• The strength characteristic of the pavement will be considered.
• Effect of load repetitions is to be allowed because of the fatigue behavior
of materials under repeated loadings.
1. Empirical methods
2. Analytical methods
 Empirical methods based on a study of observed performance of airfield
pavements over a period of time are based on experiments or experiences.
 Corps of Engineers method based on CBR value.
 Analytical methods utilize the stress-strain behavior of pavements of
pavement under load and have a theoretical basis.
 Bermisters theory.