Road roughness evaluation using in-pavement strain sensors

Most transportation agencies now collect pavement roughness data using the inertial profilers, which requires instrumented vehicles and technicians with specialized training to interpret the results. The extensive labor requirements of the profiling activities limit data collection for portions of the national highway system to at most once per year, resulting in outdated roughness data for decision making of maintenance needs. In this paper, a real-time roughness evaluation method was developed by linking the output of durable in-pavement strain sensors to road roughness level. The durable in-pavement sensors will continuously provide information of road roughness in real time after they are installed and calibrated during the road construction until the service life of the associated pavement. Field tests validated the developed strain method by comparison with standard inertial profiling method and the connected-vehicle method. The comparison of the results from the field tests approves the effectiveness of the developed road roughness evaluation method using in-pavement strain sensors, which can be further applied practically for needed concrete pavements.

[1]  E. C. Klaubert.  HIGHWAY EFFECTS ON VEHICLE PERFORMANCE , 2001 .

[2]  Bruce D. Van Deusen.  Analytical Techniques for Designing Riding Quality Into Automotive Vehicles , 1967 .

[3]  W A Hyman,et al.  Improvements in data acquisition technology for maintenance management systems , 1990 .

[4]  Zhi Zhou,et al.  Optical fiber Bragg grating sensor assembly for 3D strain monitoring and its case study in highway pavement , 2012 .

[5]  R Robinson,et al.  Tables for estimating vehicle operating costs on rural roads in developing countries , 1976 .

[6]  Raj Bridgelall,et al.  Connected Vehicle Approach for Pavement Roughness Evaluation , 2014 .

[7]  Michael S Mamlouk,et al.  Mechanistic Roughness Model Based on Vehicle-Pavement Interaction , 2000 .

[8]  Raj Bridgelall,et al.  Road roughness evaluation using in-pavement strain sensors , 2015 .

[9]  Ying Huang,et al.  Glass fiber–reinforced polymer–packaged fiber Bragg grating sensors for ultra-thin unbonded concrete overlay monitoring , 2015 .

[10]  K H McGhee,et al.  AUTOMATED PAVEMENT DISTRESS COLLECTION TECHNIQUES , 2004 .

[11]  T D Gillespie,et al.  ROLE OF ROAD ROUGHNESS IN VEHICLE RIDE , 1981 .

[12]  Theunis F. P. Henning,et al.  Identifying pavement deterioration by enhancing the definition of road roughness , 2010 .

[13]  Yang H. Huang,et al.  Pavement Analysis and Design , 1997 .

[14]  Raj Bridgelall,et al.  Inertial Sensor Sample Rate Selection for Ride Quality Measures , 2015 .

[15]  S. Timoshenko,et al.  THEORY OF PLATES AND SHELLS , 1959 .

[16]  G. G. Stokes.  "J." , 1890, The New Yale Book of Quotations.