Performance of unbound aggregate bases and implications for inverted base pavements

Papadopoulos, Efthymios

Title:

Performance of unbound aggregate bases and implications for inverted base pavements

dc.contributor.advisor	Santamarina, J. Carlos
dc.contributor.author	Papadopoulos, Efthymios
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Frost, David
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Mayne, Paul
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Rix, Glenn
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Huber, Chris
dc.contributor.department	Civil and Environmental Engineering
dc.date.accessioned	2014-05-22T15:28:07Z
dc.date.available	2014-05-22T15:28:07Z
dc.date.created	2014-05
dc.date.issued	2014-04-07
dc.date.submitted	May 2014
dc.date.updated	2014-05-22T15:28:07Z
dc.description.abstract	The current economic situation has severely affected the US road infrastructure and funding has become inadequate for either maintenance or future growth. The inverted base pavement structure is a promising alternative to achieve high quality roads at considerably lower cost than conventional pavements. The proximity of the unbound granular base layer to the tire load makes the response of the granular base critical to the performance of the pavement structure. Therefore extensive material characterization is conducted on the granular materials that make the base. In particular, a true triaxial chamber is developed to study the mechanical response and the stress-dependent stiffness of granular bases compacted at different water contents. A novel method is developed to assess the as-built stress-dependent anisotropic stiffness of granular bases in-situ using both crosshole and uphole test configurations. The two inverted base pavements built in Georgia at the Morgan County quarry haul road and the Lagrange south Loop are tested as part of this study. A nonlinear orthotropic constitutive model is selected to capture the deformational behavior of compacted granular bases. The response of the pavement is analyzed by implementing this constitutive behavior in a three-dimensional finite-element model. Different pavement structures are simulated. It is shown that thin asphalt concrete layers resting directly on granular bases deform as membranes. Finally, numerical simulations are extended to compare inverted base pavements to conventional pavements used in practice. Results highlight the inadequacy of ASSHTO’s structural layer coefficient for the analysis of inverted base pavement structures as well as the potential economic advantages of inverted base pavements.
dc.description.degree	Ph.D.
dc.format.mimetype	application/pdf
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/1853/51846
dc.language.iso	en_US
dc.publisher	Georgia Institute of Technology
dc.subject	Inverted pavements
dc.subject	Granular bases
dc.subject	True triaxial
dc.subject	Pavements
dc.subject	Geomaterials
dc.subject.lcsh	Pavements, Flexible
dc.subject.lcsh	Granular materials
dc.subject.lcsh	Pavements Subgrades
dc.title	Performance of unbound aggregate bases and implications for inverted base pavements
dc.type	Text
dc.type.genre	Dissertation
dspace.entity.type	Publication
local.contributor.advisor	Santamarina, J. Carlos
local.contributor.corporatename	School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
local.contributor.corporatename	College of Engineering
relation.isAdvisorOfPublication	b2384ae5-0372-4d9a-ac49-9eaf26604d75
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication	88639fad-d3ae-4867-9e7a-7c9e6d2ecc7c
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication	7c022d60-21d5-497c-b552-95e489a06569
thesis.degree.level	Doctoral