International Journal of Advanced Engineering Research and Technology (IJAERT) 163

Volume 2 Issue 6, September 2014, ISSN No.: 2348 8190

ANALYSIS OF COMBINED STRESSES IN HIGH-PERFORMANCE

CONCRETE PAVEMENTS A REVIEW
Kamalakara G.K1, Srikanth.M.Naik2, Suresh Kumar K.S3
Assistant professor, Rajarajeswari College of Engineering, Bangalore, Karnataka, India
1
Professor, M.S. Ramiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore, Karnataka, India
3
Research Scholar, Department of Civil Engineering, Bangalore University, Bangalore, India
1

ABSTRACT
Concrete materials mostly High Performance Concretes
produced (HPC) today contain materials in addition to
Portland cement to help achieve the compressive
strength, flexural strength and durability performance.
These materials include fly ash, silica fume and groundgranulated blast furnace slag, used separately or in
combination. At the same time, chemical admixtures
such as high-range water-reducers are needed to ensure
that the concrete is easy to transport, place and finish.
Most HPC have high cement content and a watercement ratio of 0.40 or less. However, the proportions
of the individual constituents vary depending on local
preferences and local materials. These concretes are
also more sensitive to changes in constituent material
properties than conventional concretes. Variations in
the chemical and physical properties of the
cementitious materials and chemical admixtures need to
be carefully monitored. Substitutions of alternate
materials can result in changes in the performance
characteristics that may not be acceptable for HighPerformance Concrete. This means that a greater degree
of quality control is required for the successful
production of HPC. These are being used now a day in
pavement construction. Pavements are designed
basically to resist combined stresses.There are several
factors that influence the structural performance of
these concrete pavements. However, the foremost
factors that contribute to the degradation of these
pavements are the various environmental conditions
and the numerous heavy loads they have to endure. The
goal of pavement design is to provide a structure
capable of carrying the expected traffic loads over a
period of time that will resist environmental
degradation at the lowest possible cost.
Keywords- High Performance Concrete, Durability,
Aggregates, Flexural strength

1. INTRODUCTION
Cement concrete roads have long service life of more
than 40 years, Increased strength with age, Resistance
to oil, chemicals and weather, Ability to withstand
heavy axle loads without rutting, Resistance to sub
grade failure by spreading wheel loads, Excellent light

reflection providing greater visibility, Cost-effective

design and construction, Built-in skid resistance and
improve traction, Ability to meet specific design life
requirements, Adaptability to use locally available raw
materials which can also be recycled, thus saving scarce
resources and Withstanding extreme weather conditions
(such as wide-ranging temperatures, heavy rainfall and
water-logging) better than bituminous roads.
Until the year 2000, the Ministry of Road Transport and
Highways specified that OPC-33, OPC-43 and OPC-53
cements should be used for concrete road construction,
with a preference for using OPC-43 or higher grades.
However, now this has changed.
The revised
specification through amendment no.3 to IRC 21-2000
by Indian Roads Congress-2008 allows blended
cements such as the Portland Slag Cement (PSC) and
Portland Pozzolana cement (PPC) along with OPCs to
be used in highway constructions. The aim of structural
design is to determine the number, material
composition and thickness of the different layers within
a pavement structure required to accommodate a given
loading. The rigid pavement, structural design is mainly
concerned with determining the appropriate slab
thickness based on traffic loads, underlying material
properties and joint design. This is done by considering
a variety of stresses that affect rigid pavement
performance such as curling, warping, wheel load and
shrinkage/expansion stresses.
Pavements are typically designed for a specified
"design life". Design life (or "design period") is the
time from original construction to a terminal condition
for a pavement structure. Structural design is carried
out so that the pavement structure is sufficient to
withstand the traffic loading encountered over the
pavement's design life. It is recognized that intermittent
maintenance and rehabilitation efforts may be needed to
preserve a pavement's surface quality and ensure that
the structure lasts through the design life.
Concrete having improved strength and durability
properties is termed as High Performance Concrete
(HPC). The American Concrete Institute (ACI) defines
High Performance Concrete as Concrete meeting
special performance and uniformity requirements which
cannot always be achieved routinely using only
conventional constituents and normal mixing, placing

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International Journal of Advanced Engineering Research and Technology (IJAERT) 164

Volume 2 Issue 6, September 2014, ISSN No.: 2348 8190
and curing practices. HPC is simply a concrete which
is expected to provide superior performance in a
particular application. That application may or may not
require a higher compressive strength. Most HPCs
produced today contain materials in addition to
Portland cement to help achieve the strength or
durability performance [10]. The mechanical and
durability properties of concrete can be enhanced by
using admixtures to improve the strength of aggregatematrix interface and control the extent and propagation
of cracks by using fibers. These materials include fly
ash, silica fume and ground-granulated blast furnace
slag used separately or in combination. At the same
time, chemical admixtures such as high-range waterreducers are needed to ensure that the concrete is easy
to transport, place and finish. For high-strength
concretes, a combination of mineral and chemical
admixtures is nearly always essential to ensure
achievement of the required strength. Fibers such as
steel, nylon, polypropylene, polyethylene, glass,
asbestos, carbon and natural fibers are also used in
HPCCs.
1.1
SILICA FUME
Condensed silica fume is a by-product from electric arc
furnaces used in the manufacture of silicon metal or
silicon alloys. It exhibits excellent pozzolanic
characteristics. Concrete with condensed silica fume,
with its high strength and durability has proved
popu1arly beneficial in areas where structures are
subjected to severe environmental conditions. The
addition of silica fume to a concrete mix along with
appropriate chemical additives also improves its plastic
properties such as workability, pumpability, cohesion,
adhesion, and gives reduced bleeding and very fine
surface finish.
1.2
FLY ASH
Fly ash is a finely divided residue obtained from the
combustion of powdered coal and transported by the
flue gasses and collected by electrostatic precipitator.
The important property of fly ash is its spherical form;
because of its spherical shape it improves the
workability of concrete. When fly ash is used in
concrete it contributes to the strength of concrete due to
its pozzolanic reactivity. However, since the pozzolanic
reaction proceeds slowly, the initial strength of fly ash
concrete tends to be lower than that of the concrete
without fly ash. Due to the continued pozzolanic
reactivity, concrete develops greater strength at later
age, which may exceed that of the concrete without fly
ash. The pozzolanic reaction also contributes to make
the concrete dense, resulting in decrease of water
permeability and a more durable concrete.

1.3 GROUND GRANULATED BLAST FURNACE

SLAG
Ground granulated blast furnace slag is a by-productof
the iron making industry and comes from the iron
blastfurnaces. The blastfurnace slag is quenched, either
by granulation or pelletisation and then dried and
ground to a fine powder. When used in concrete, it
makes concrete with good workability, high strength,
and good durability.
1.4
FIBER
The use of fiber reinforcement is grabbing more
attention in concrete pavements. The presence of
microcracks at the mortar-aggregate interface is
responsible for the inherent weakness of plain concrete.
The weakness can be removed by inclusion of fibers in
the mix. The fibers help to transfer loads at the internal
microcracks. Such a concrete is called fiber-reinforced
concrete.
Lathe scrap steel fiber is the waste discarded as scrap
from metal industries. The scrap obtained is in the form
of machined chips or strands of steel which are cut to
required length and used as fibers. Fibers of suitable
mechanical and chemical properties are incorporated
with other concrete materials at the mixing stage. These
fibers hold the matrix together after localized cracking
and provide improved post-cracking load carrying
capacity.

2. LITERATURE SURVEY
A limited number of rigid pavement instrumentation
projects have been initiated in the past. Investigations
that were reviewed utilized various types of
instrumentation and installation techniques with varying
levels of success. Instrumentation positioning and
testing differed as well. Cable et. al. [1] reported on the
1986 instrumentation of a 40-foot by 24-foot ten inch
thick section of rigid pavement on 1-80 in Iowa. Over
120 instruments were monitored. They included
weldable strain gages on selected steel dowel bars at
three consecutive joints and concrete strain gages at
selected locations across the slab. Concrete strain gages
were installed prior to the placement of the new concrete
using steel rods to secure their position. Temperature
sensors were placed near the surface of the pavement, at
the top of the base, and six inches into the subbase.
Deflections of the slab were monitored near the joints
and at the midslab in the wheel paths using a single
layer deflectometer assembly. Cable et. al. noted that
over 90% of the instruments were found to provide a
completed electrical circuit after paving was completed.
Reports concerning the performance of the sensors and
conclusions from the project were not available. Van
Deusen, Newcomb, and Labuz [2] published a review of
instrumentation technology for the Minnesota Road

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Volume 2 Issue 6, September 2014, ISSN No.: 2348 8190
Research Project in 1988. The review discussed strain
gage circuitry, linear variable displacement transducers
(LVDTs), and earth pressure cells and the factors that
influence their performance. For strain gages, the
selection ofan appropriate transducer must balance
compliance and measurement sensitivity. All of the
commercially available strain gages tested in concrete
gave reasonable results. It was determined that
hermetically sealed LVDTs would be sufficient for
pavement applications. A set of recommendations was
provided with respect to sensor procurement and
installation specifications for the project.
Armaghani, Larson, and Smith [3] initiated research to
analyze pavement temperatures and evaluate the vertical
and horizontal displacements in test slabs in Florida.
The slabs were instrumented with LVDTs and
thermocouples at various locations. Data from all
instruments was recorded simultaneously at specific
time intervals over a period of three years. Vertical
displacements at slab corners, edges, and centers were
evaluated. Horizontal slab movements at doweled and
undoweled joints were also determined. The authors
concluded that weather conditions significantly
influenced the temperature response of pavements.
Clear, sunny weather characterized by wide variations in
ambient temperature produced larger displacements in
pavement slabs. Maximum daily displacements were
found to be concurrent with maximum temperature
differentials in the slab. N.Bueche, P. Rychen& Prof.
A.-G Dumont [4] have been carried out studies within
the European project Intelligent Roads (INTRO). The
major objective followed was to assess the potential of
optical fiber for pavement monitoring in comparison
with classical strain gauges. Thus, both measurement
devices have been tested under the same conditions in a
full scale Accelerated Pavement Testing (APT) at
LAVOC. This facility allows the user to control
different parameters such as loading configuration and
temperature and, as a matter of facts, limit the
disturbances. A total number of 10 strain gauges and 8
optical fibers have been installed and tested for various
conditions. This study showed rather consistent and
comparable results for both optical fiber and strain
gauges measurements. The comparison with calculated
deformation also highlighted the consistency of the
measurements results. The sensitivity of the
measurement system has also been highlighted and
permitted to conclude with some recommendations for
further developments.
Darestaniet. al.[5] has been investigated the behavior of
concrete pavements under dynamic loads, however, has
not received much attention and hence is not well
understood at present. To address this need, a 3D finite
element analysis using diverse axle groups with
different speeds from 2 km/h to 110 km/h has been

performed. Two pavement types namely, jointed plain

concrete pavement (JPCP) and jointed reinforced
concrete pavement (JRCP) are investigated. Maximum
dynamic tensile stresses and deflections influence lines
are presented to demonstrate the pavement response, and
calibrated against existing results. Critical speed and
dynamic amplification are also determined as well as
critical location of fatigue cracking. His results indicate
that dynamic analysis is essential for pavement design,
particularly for JPCP. Chia-Pei Chouet. al. [6]
Conducted studies on optical fiber sensors for measuring
concrete joint movements were embedded in the
concrete slabs during the reconstruction of primary
taxiway at Chiang Kai-Shek International Airport since
Jan. 2002. Field data have been collected regularly for
the first 13days of concrete curing, and continuously 48
hours per month on a monthly basis. Readings of the
sensor 7 demonstrate the joint movements with seasonal
temperature changes. That was found that the induced
crack occurred four days after joint saw cut and the
initial crack width was about 0.29 mm. Concrete slabs
shrink during the curing time, mainly due to the drying
shrinkage. Joint movement becomes more sensitive to
air temperature around two weeks after curing. The slab
moves toward joint when air temperature increases from
January to June, and backward to its center line from
September to January. The measured average moving
rate was 0.035 mm per Celsius degree for a 7 m long
slab. Due to the limited space at joint, slabs stayed at the
closest condition for almost four months, from June to
September, with the maximum horizontal compressive
stress of 41 kg per square centimeter (586 psi). A
Prediction model of the readings of joint movement
sensor was derived in their study, and the joint
movements can be predicted by two regression
equations with an average error percentage of 5.8%.
Bharath Babu et. al.[7]conducted research work on High
Performance Cement Concrete (HPCC) pavements at
Bangalore University. As a part of their study static
flexural strengths were determined for Conventional
Concrete (CC), Silica Fume Concrete (SFC), High
Volume Fly Ash Concrete (HVFAC), Fiber Reinforced
Concrete (FRC), and Fiber Reinforced High Volume Fly
Ash Concrete (FRHVFAC) using third point loading in
the laboratory. Laboratory fatigue tests were also carried
out on HPCC beam specimens and number of repetitions
to failure determined. Using the results fatigue models
and stress charts were developed and slab thicknesses of
the HPCCs designed. He made an attempt to analyze the
HPCC pavements using a 2-D Finite Element Analysis
(FEA) software - KENPAVE. The critical flexural
stresses obtained using the FEA software are compared
with stresses obtained from the experimental study. The
design life of the HPCC pavements was also analyzed
using the FEA software. The variation in flexural

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Volume 2 Issue 6, September 2014, ISSN No.: 2348 8190
stresses was obtained from FEA software when
compared with actual flexural stresses ranges from 5 to
6 %. Damage analysis using FEA software shows that
predicted design life obtained ranges from 1 to 12 % for
various HPCCs. The 12 % variationis for Fiber
Reinforced HPCCs indicating that the design life of
fiber reinforced HPCCs are more.
NimaAlaet. al.[8] carried out studies to assess the merits
of the Mechanistic Empirical Pavement Design
approach[10] and attempts to calibrate theprocedure for
application in Nebraska. Mechanistic Empirical (M-E)
design of pavements is a new approach to pavement
design. The method consists of two components;
Mechanistic and Empirical. The empirical part tries to
sum up the damages inflected to the pavement during
the short time steps that the pavement is subjected to and
attempts to predict the accumulated damage as function
of time. His project consisted of two parts. First a
parametric study was carried out to identify the
parameters that are important and level of sophistication
that is needed at the input level. The next step was to
develop filed instrumentation plan and start collecting
data and then continue with calibration process. The
computer program that was used in conjunction with
MEPDG program and approach for field instrumentation
was developed. He concluded that there is one
parameter in the program, referred to as permanent
curl/wrap effective temperature difference that needs
calibration.

3. RIGID PAVEMENT DESIGN

improvements forecasted for the nation's infrastructure,

the potential financial benefit of an instrumentation
project is tremendous. Improvements in pavement
design originating from such a project could mean
longer life highways thus minimizing future costs to
road users. The focus of this particular research is to
develop a laboratory and field instrumentation program
to measure the responses of a concrete pavement
system subjected to loading and various environmental
conditions. Responses specified for measurement
include; slab stresses, slab strain, temperature gradient
through the slab thickness [12].

4. CONCLUSIONS

Dynamic analysis of the concrete pavement is

important as dynamic loads result in greater
induced tensile stress and deflection which can
ultimately cause severe deterioration in the
concrete slab.
The validated FEM can be used on parameters
affecting pavement responses such as
environmental effects, different boundary
condition between concrete slab and subbase.
From the combined stresses it is possible to
analyze the critical stresses.
The model developed can be used for designing
high performance cement concrete pavements
to minimize deteriorations of the concrete
slabs.

REFERENCES

The two principal methods of rigid pavement structural

design in use today are empirical and mechanisticempirical. Mechanistic-empirical design is a method of
designing highway pavements. It combines empirical
relationships obtained from the field data with
theoretical predictions based on the mechanics of
materials. This method relates inputs such as traffic,
loadings, soil strength, climate, etc[11]. to the actual
pavement response. Mechanistic-empirical method is
more accurate than the empirical method because the
empirical method only relies on the field performance,
while the mechanistic-empirical method combines both
the field performance and theoretical prediction models.
This review attempts to develop a design methodology
using the mechanistic empirical concept. Today, the
Indian Road Congress- 58 (IRC:58-2011) [13]
pavement design guide is used for most new
construction. However, these guidelines were
established with limited consideration given to various
environmental conditions and not considered the design
of HPC pavement. As a means of verifying or
improving these design methods a full scale pavement
instrumentation project can be constructed to measure
the insitu responses of the slab. Considering the cost of
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[1] Cable, J.K., Klaiber, F. W ., and Lee, D.Y.,

Pavement Instrumentation, Interim Report for
FHWA Contract DTFH71-86-621-IA-19, p.37.
[2] Amaghani, J.M., Torbjorn, J.L., and Lawerence,
L.S., "Temperature Response of Concrete
Pavements," Transportation Research Record 1
12 1 -Effects of Temuerature and Water on
Pavement Performance, p.23-33.
[3] Van Deusen, D.A., Newcomb, D.E., and Labuz,
J.F., A Review of Instrumentation Technology
for the Minnesota Road Research Proiect, Final
Report for MNDOT Contract 66063, p. 14,26
[4] N. Bueche, P. Rychen& Prof. A.-G. Dumont.,
Optical fiber feasibility study in Accelerated
Pavement
Testing
Facility,Lausanne,
Switzerland, 2007.
[5] Darestani M. Y., Thambiratnam D. P., Baweja
D., and Nataatmadja A. Dynamic Response of
Concrete Pavements under Vehicular Loads,
the Proc. IABSE Symposium:Responding to
Tomorrows
Challenges
in
Structural
Engineering, Budapest, Hungary, 2006.
[6] Chia-Pei Chou., Hsiang-Jen Cheng., Analysis
of Concrete Joint Movements and Seasonal

International Journal of Advanced Engineering Research and Technology (IJAERT) 167

Volume 2 Issue 6, September 2014, ISSN No.: 2348 8190
Thermal Stresses at the Chiang Kai-Shek
International Airport,Journal of the Eastern
Asia Society for Transportation Studies, Vol. 6,
pp. 1217 - 1230, 2005.
[7] BharathBabu M.D., Amarnath M.S., Suresh
Kumar K.S., Analysis of HPCC Pavements
Using KenpaveFea Software, International
Journal of Research in Engineering and
Technology, 2013.
[8] Hani H., Titi., and Emil G. Bautista,
Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Analysis and
Design, National Center for Freight &
Infrastructure Research & Education Paper No.
13-2, September 23, 2013.
[9] Binod
Kumar.,
RenuMathur.,
&
S.
Gangopadhyay., Rigid Pavement Response to
Environmental and Traffic Loading Investigated
Through Instrumentation,Highway Research
Journal,Volume 5 No. 2, July - December 2012.
[10]
Tommy Nantung.,High Performance
Concrete Pavement in Indiana, Joint
Transportation Research Program, Indiana

www.ijaert.org

Department of Transportation and Purdue

University, West Lafayette, Indiana, 2011.
[11]
Nima
Ala.,
Mohammad
AjmalStanigzai.,AtorodAzizinamini.,
Development of Field Data for Effective
Implementation of Mechanistic Empirical
Pavement Design Procedure, National Bridge
Research Organization (NaBRO)., June 2009.
[12]
Rania E., Asbahan., and Julie M.
Vandenbossche, P.E., Effects of Temperature
and Moisture Gradients on Slab Deformation for
JPCPs, American Society of Civil Engineers
Transportation Journal.
[13]
IRC: 582011, Guidelines For The
Design Of Plain Joint Rigid Pavements For
Highway, Indian Road Congress, New Delhi.