IMPROVED JOINT DESIGN THROUGH LTPP-BASED JOINT FAULTING KNOWLEDGE BASE

摘要

Joint faulting is the most critical type of distress affecting the smoothness of jointed concrete pavements over their design life. Therefore, controlling joint faulting is extremely important in joint design. This paper describes results of the LTPP joint faulting cause analyses and provides practical recommendations for the improved Jointed Plain Concrete Pavement (JPCP) joint design procedures. The recommendations are based on the knowledge base developed using the LTPP Information Management System (IMS). The analyses indicate that joints could be properly designed to exhibit very little faulting even after many years of heavy traffic. The key design feature is dowel bars with proper diameter. For non-doweled JPCP, the following design features were found to significantly reduce faulting: use of widened lanes, drainage (edge drains only were analyzed), stabilized base/subbase, and shorter joint spacing. The results of the study are based on the analysis of joint faulting and other pavement-related data obtained from over 300 LTPP pavement sections located throughout United States and Canada. This paper would be of interest to pavement engineers involved in the design of PCC pavements and analysts interested in development of improved PCC pavement design procedures.