Modeling and Simulation of Collisions of Heavy Trucks with Concrete Barriers
Publication: Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 133, Issue 8
Abstract
On-site collision tests of full-scale concrete barriers are an important method to understand what happens to concrete barriers when vehicles collide with them. However, such tests require both time and money, so modeling and simulation of collisions by computer have been developed as an alternative in this research. First, spring subgrade models were developed to formulate the ground boundary of concrete barriers based on previous experiments. Then, the finite element method models were developed for both heavy trucks and concrete barriers to simulate their dynamic collision performances. Comparison of the results generated from computer simulations and on-site experiments demonstrates that the developed models can be applied to simulate the collision of heavy trucks with concrete barriers, to replicate the movement of the truck at the collision, and to investigate the performance of the concrete barriers. The developed research methodology can be widely used to support the design of new concrete barriers and the safety analysis of existing ones.
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Acknowledgments
Many thanks are due to Mr. Kazuhiro Ando in the Public Works Research Institute of Japan for proving the full-scale experiment data and commenting on the computer simulation. The partial financial support of the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports, and Culture in Japan as the Foundation of Science Research (No. 11555124) is gratefully acknowledged. The writers would like to thank three anonymous referees for their helpful suggestions and corrections on earlier drafts of the paper.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 133 • Issue 8 • August 2007
Pages: 462 - 468
Copyright
© 2007 ASCE.
History
Received: Sep 27, 2005
Accepted: Oct 31, 2006
Published online: Aug 1, 2007
Published in print: Aug 2007
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