Chapter one

Overview of pavement structures

A pavement is one type of hard surface made from durable surface material lay down
on an area intended to carry vehicular traffic.
 its main function is to distribute the applied vehicle loads to the sub-grade through
different layers.
The field of pavement design is dynamic.
the concepts are changing with time as technology develops and new equipment
emerges for
 site investigation,
material testing
traffic data collection, and
new data become available
 In the early stage, pavement design was carried out by a rule of-thumb procedure
based on entirely past experience. 1
 Cont’d
 Through the observation of performances of the already constructed
roads, highway engineers became aware that pavement performance is
dependent on the subgrade soils.
Pavements constructed over plastic soils showed higher distress than
those constructed over granular deposits.
With the knowledge of soil mechanics, pavement design was made
with soil classification.
A pavement structure is a layer structure which supports the vehicle
load on its surface and
 transfers and spreads the load to the subgrade without exceeding
either the strength of the subgrade or the internal strength of the
pavement itself.

2
 Cont’d
The basic idea in building a pavement for all weathered is to prepare
a suitable sub-grade, provide necessary drainage, and to provide
sufficient thickness and sufficient strength.
The constructed pavement will:
Have sufficient total thickness and internal strength to carry
expected traffic loads, and distribute them over the subgrade soil
without overstressing;
 Have adequate properties to prevent or minimize the penetration
or internal accumulation of moisture; and
Have a surface that is reasonably smooth and skid resistant at the
same time, as well as reasonably resistant to wear, distortion and
deterioration by vehicle loads and weather.
3
 Cont’d
For a very low traffic where the soil can be trafficable and,
when there is economic limitation the natural subgrade soil can be made to
carry the traffic load after clearing and shaping.
 Such earth roads give seasonal services and require reshaping after seasonal
changes.
Better than earth roads, gravel surfaced roads are also constructed by
spreading gravel over the subgrade, shaping and compacting
To avoid excessive strain at the subgrade level.
to give services usually in all seasons.
In the case of gravel-surfaced roads
 reshaping is necessary, but not as frequent as in earth roads.
 Gravel roads follow selected routes and designed to carry low to medium
traffic and serve as stage construction.
The surface material should be kept to a certain standard such as grading and
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 Types of Pavements
There are two types of pavements based on design considerations i.e.
flexible pavement and rigid pavement.
Difference between flexible and rigid pavements is based on the manner in
which the loads are distributed to the subgrade.
A flexible pavement is one
which has low flexural strength, and
 the load is largely transmitted to the subgrade soil
the lateral distribution of stresses with increasing depth as
shown in Figure 1:2.
The pavement trickiness is designed such that
– the stresses on the subgrade soil are kept within its bearing capacity and
– the subgrade is prevented from excessive deformation.
The strength and smoothness of flexible pavement structure depends to a5
 Cont’d

Figure1:1-Flexible pavement layer

Figure1:2- stress distribution through flexible pavement structure. 6

 Cont’d
Generally, three types of flexible pavement construction have been
used for flexible pavements:
 conventional flexible pavement,
 full-depth asphalt pavement
contained rock asphalt mat (CRAM) construction is still in the
experimental stage and has not been widely accepted for practical
use.

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 Conventional Flexible pavements
Conventional flexible pavements are multilayered structures with
 better materials on top where the intensity of stress is high and
 inferior materials at the bottom where the intensity is low.
This design principle makes possible to use local materials and usually
results in a most economical design.
This is particularly true in regions where high-quality materials are
expensive but local materials of inferior quality are readily available.
 Starting from the top, a conventional flexible pavement normally consists
of:
 surface course,
 base course,
 subbase course,
compacted subgrade, and
natural subgrade.
The use of the various courses is based on either necessity or economy
and some of the courses may be omitted.
8
 Cont’d

Figure1:3- Section through flexible pavement

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 Surface Course
The surface course is the top course of an asphalt
pavement, sometimes called the wearing course.
It is usually constructed by dense graded hot-mix
asphalt.
It is a structural part of the pavement, which must
be tough to resist distortion under traffic and
provide a smooth and skid-resistant riding surface.
The surface course must be waterproof to protect
the entire pavement and subgrade from the
weakening effect of water. 10
 Base Course
The base course is the layer of material immediately beneath
the surface course.
It may be composed of well-graded crushed stone
(unbounded), granular material mixed with binder, or
stabilized materials.
It is the main structural part of the pavement and provides a
level surface for laying the surface layer.
It constructed directly over the subgrade, it prevents
intrusions of the fine subgrade soils into the pavement
structure.
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 Sub-base Course
The subbase course is the layer of material beneath
the base course constructed using:
– local and cheaper materials for economic
reason on top of the subgrade.
 It provides additional help to the base course and the
upper layers in distributing the load.
 It facilitates drainage of free water that might get
accumulated below the pavement.
 If the base course is open graded, the subbase course
with more fines can serve as a filter between the
subgrade and the base course. 12
 Subgrade
Sub-grade is the foundation on which the vehicle load
and the weight of the pavement layers finally rest.
 It is an insitu or a layer of selected material
compacted to the desirable density near the optimum
moisture content.
It is graded into
– a proper shape,
– properly drained, and
– compacted to receive the pavement layers
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 Full-Depth Asphalt Pavements
Full-depth asphalt pavements are constructed by:
 placing one or more layers of hot-mix asphalt
directly on the sub-grade or improved sub-grade.
 This concept was generally considered as:
 the most cost-effective and
 dependable type of asphalt pavement for heavy
traffic
quite popular in areas where local materials are
not available 14
 Rigid Pavements
Rigid pavements are pavement structures constructed of cement
concrete slabs, which derive their capacity to withstand vehicle loads
from flexural strength or beam strength due to high modulus of
elasticity.
Because of high flexural strength, the vehicle load on cement concrete
slab is distributed over a relatively wider area of the soil than flexible
pavements and
 thus, variation in the subgrade soil strength has little influence.
The flexural strength also permits the slab to bridge over minor
irregularities under it.
 Thus, the performance of rigid pavements is more governed by the
strength of the concrete slab than the subgrade supports.
 Hence, the major factor considered in the design of rigid pavement 15
is
the structural strength of the concrete.
 Cont’d
The sub-grade may provide a uniform support for the slab.
However, where the sub-grade soil cannot provide a uniform
support, or for one or more of the following reasons
described here under, there is always a necessity to build a
base course under cement concrete slab and it is widely used
for rigid pavements.
 Control pumping
Control of frost action
 Improvement of drainage
Control of shrinkage and swell
 Expedition of construction 16
 Control of pumping
Pumping is defined as the ejection of water and subgrade
soil through
• joints, cracks, and along the edges of the pavements
caused by the downward movements of due to heavy axle
loads.
 Pumping occurs when there is void space under the slab
due to
 temperature curling of the slab,
 deformation of the subgrade or both and
erodible material under the slab is saturated.
 It leads to faulting and cracking of the slab if not corrected
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in time.
 Control of frost action
Heave caused by the increase in volume of
freezed water and the formation and
continuing expansion of ice lenses causes the
concrete slab to break and softens the subgrade
during frost melts period.
This occurs when the soil within the depth of
frost penetration is frost susceptible (e.g. clay),
there is supply of moisture, and the
temperature freezes for a sufficient period of
time. 18
 Improvement of drainage
When the water table is high and close to the ground
surface,
– a base course can raise the pavement to a
desirable elevation above the water table.
 An open-graded base course
– provides an internal drainage system capable of
rapidly removing water that seeps through pavement
cracks and joints carry it away to the road side.
A dense-graded or stabilized base course
– can also serve as a waterproofing layer.
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 Control of shrinkage and swell
When the change in moisture causes subgrade
to shrink or swell,
– the base course can serve as a surcharge load
to reduce the amount of shrinkage and swell in
addition to its use of improving drainage.
 Measures that are taken to reduce entering
water into the sub-grade further reduce the
shrinkage and swell potentials.
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 Expedition of Construction
A base course can be used as a working
platform for heavy construction equipment.
Under severe weather conditions,
– a base course can keep the surface
clean and dry and facilitate the construction
work

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 Types of Concrete Pavement
Concrete pavements can be classified into four types:
 Jointed oriented plain concrete pavement (JPCP),
 jointed reinforced concrete pavement (JRCP),
 continuous reinforced concrete pavement (CRCP),
 Pre-stressed concrete pavement (PCP)

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 Cont’d
Jointed plain concrete pavements are plain concrete pavements
constructed with closely spaced contraction joints.
 Dowels or aggregate interlocks may be used for load transfer across
the joints.
In jointed reinforced concrete pavements are concrete pavements
with steel reinforcements in the form of wire mesh or deformed bars
mainly to allow the use of longer joint spacing but do not increase the
structural capacity of pavements.
Because of the longer panel length, dowels are required for load
transfer across the joints.
The amount of distributed steel increases with the increase in joint
spacing and is designed to hold the slab together after cracking.
23
 Cont’d
Continuous reinforced concrete pavements are reinforced
concrete pavements designed joint-free for the purpose of
eliminating joints, which are the weak spots in rigid pavements.
 The elimination of joints would decrease the thickness of
pavement required.
 Concrete is weak in tension but strong in compression.
The thickness of concrete pavement required is governed by its
modulus of rupture, which varies, with the tensile strength of
the concrete.
The pre-application of a compressive stress to the concrete
greatly reduces the tensile stress caused by the traffic loads and
thus decreases the thickness of concrete required. 24
 Cont’d
The pre-stressed concrete pavements
– have less probability of cracking and fewer
transverse joints and therefore result in less
maintenance and longer pavement life.
 Pre-stressed concrete has been used more
frequently for airport pavements than for
highway pavements because the saving in
thickness for airport pavements is much greater
than that for highway pavements. 25
 Cont’d
Composite pavements are pavements composed of cement
concrete as a bottom layer and hot-mix asphalt as a top
layer to obtain an ideal pavement with the most desirable
characteristics.
–The cement concrete slab provides a strong base and the
hot-mix asphalt provides a smooth and non-reflective
surface.
However, this type of pavement is very expensive and is
rarely used as a new construction.
Composite pavements include rehabilitated concrete
pavements using asphalt overlays, and asphalt pavements 26
 Cont’d
For flexible pavements with untreated bases, the most
critical tensile stress or strain is located at the bottom
of asphalt layer,
while for composite pavements the most critical
location is at the bottom of the cement concrete slab
or stabilized bases.
A disadvantage of this construction the occurrence of
reflection cracks on the asphalt surface due to
the joints and cracks in the rigid base layer. 27
 Basic Design Factors
Design factors can be divided into four broad
categories:
 traffic loading,
environment,
materials,
failure criteria

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