Development of a New Mechanistic Empirical Rutting Model for Unbound Granular Material
Publication: Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 28, Issue 8
Abstract
This paper proposes a new mechanistic-empirical rutting (MER) model to evaluate the permanent deformation (PD) behavior of unbound granular material (UGM). To characterize the stress dependence of rutting behavior in UGM, the MER model incorporated a softening stress term and a hardening stress term into the Tseng-Lytton model, which is based on the Drucker-Prager plastic yield criterion. Repeated load triaxial tests were performed on two types of UGMs in this study, employing seven stress states to calibrate the model coefficients, and two stress states to validate the accuracy of the model predictions. The correlations of the two incorporated stress terms with the accumulated permanent strains were established based on the triaxial test results. It was found that the correlations are fitted by power functions with 0.97–0.99 values. The proposed MER model was compared with the existing UGM rutting models, including the MEPDG model, Korkiala-Tanttu model, and UIUC model in terms of differences between the laboratory-measured and model-predicted PDs. Compared to the existing UGM rutting models, the MER model is better able to characterize the stress-dependent rutting behavior of UGM at various stress states. In addition, the prediction accuracy of the MER model is significantly higher than the existing models. A sensitivity analysis was also performed to evaluate the effects of cohesion and friction angle on the PD behavior. This demonstrates the potential of the MER model to characterize the moisture sensitivity of rutting behavior for the UGM. Finally, the MER model was implemented in a nonlinear finite element program to predict the rut depth of a flexible pavement. Compared to the MEPDG model, the MER model always predicts higher rut depths of the base layer and is more sensitive than the MEPDG model to the variations of load magnitude and base modulus.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP). Special thanks are given to Lubinda Walubita and Sang Ick Lee from the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, and Elie Hajj from University of Nevada, Reno, for their help in material collection.
References
AASHTO. (2003). “Standard method of test for resilient modulus of subgrade soils and untreated base/subbase materials.” AASHTO T307-99, Washington, DC.
Adu-Osei, A., Little, D. N., and Lytton, R. L. (2001). “Cross-anisotropic characterization of unbound granular materials.” Transp. Res. Rec., 1757(1), 82–91.
Al-Qadi, I. L., Wang, H., and Tutumluer, E. (2010). “Dynamic analysis of thin asphalt pavements by using cross-anisotropic stress-dependent properties for granular layer.” Transp. Res. Rec., 2154(1), 156–163.
ASTM. (2012). “Standard test methods for laboratory compaction characteristics of soil using modified effort.” ASTM D1557-12, West Conshohocken, PA.
Chazallon, C., Hornych, P., and Mouhoubi, S. (2006). “Elastoplastic model for the long-term behavior modeling of unbound granular materials in flexible pavements.” Int. J. Geomech., 279–289.
Chen, C., Ge, L., and Zhang, J. (2010). “Modeling permanent deformation of unbound granular materials under repeated loads.” Int. J. Geomech., 236–241.
Chow, L. (2014). “Permanent deformation behavior of unbound granular materials and rutting model development.” Master’s thesis, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL.
Chow, L., Mishra, D., and Tutumluer, E. (2014). “Framework for development of an improved unbound aggregate base rutting model for mechanistic-empirical pavement design.” Transp. Res. Rec., 2401(1), 11–21.
Desai, C. S. (1980). “A general basis for yield, failure and potential function in plasticity.” Int. J. Numer. Anal. Methods Geomech., 4(4), 361–375.
Desai, C. S., and Faruque, M. O. (1984). “Constitutive model for geologic materials.” J. Eng. Mech. Div., 1391–1408.
Drucker, D. C., and Prager, W. (1952). “Soil mechanics and plastic analysis for limit design.” Q. Appl. Math., 10(2), 157–165.
Epps, J., et al. (2014). “Development of a specification for flexible base construction.”, College Station, TX, 414.
Erlingsson, S., and Rahman, M. (2013). “Evaluation of permanent deformation characteristics of unbound granular materials by means of multistage repeated-load triaxial tests.” Transp. Res. Rec., 2369(1), 11–19.
Gabr, A., and Cameron, D. (2013). “Permanent strain modeling of recycled concrete aggregate for unbound pavement construction.” J. Mater. Civ. Eng., 1394–1402.
Gauch, H. G., Hwang, J. T., and Fick, G. W. (2003). “Model evaluation by comparison of model-based predictions and measured values.” Agron. J., 95(6), 1442–1446.
Gu, F., Sahin, H., Luo, X., Luo, R., and Lytton, R. (2014). “Estimation of resilient modulus of unbound aggregates using performance-related base course properties.” J. Mater. Civ. Eng., 04014188.
Kenis, W. J. (1977). “Predictive design procedures, VESYS user’s manual.”, Federal Highway Administration, McLean, VA.
Korkiala-Tanttu, L. (2009). “Verification of rutting calculation for unbound road materials.” Proc. Inst. Civ. Eng. Transp., 162(2), 107–114.
Lekarp, F., Isacsson, U., and Dawson, A. (2000). “State of the art. II: Permanent strain response of unbound aggregates.” J. Transp. Eng., 76–83.
Lytton, R. L., Uzan, J., Fernando, E. G., Roque, R., Hiltunen, D., and Stoffels, S. M. (1993). “Development and validation of performance prediction models and specifications for asphalt binders and paving mixtures.”, Strategic Highway Research Program, National Research Council, Washington, DC.
Matsuoka, H., and Nakai, T. (1985). “Relationship among Tresca, Mises, Mohr-Coulomb and Matsuoka-Nakai failure criterion.” Soils and Found., 25(4), 123–128.
NCHRP (National Cooperative Highway Research Program). (2003). “Harmonized test methods for laboratory determination of resilient modulus for flexible pavement design.”, Washington, DC.
Theyse, H. L. (2002). “Stiffness, strength, and performance of unbound aggregate materials: Application of South African HVS and laboratory results to California flexible pavements.”, Univ. of California Pavement Research Center, CA, 86.
Tseng, K. H., and Lytton, R. L. (1989). “Prediction of permanent deformation in flexible pavements materials, implication of aggregates in the design, construction, and performance of flexible pavements.” ASTM STP 1016, ASTM, West Conshohocken, PA, 154–172.
Tutumluer, E. (2013). “Practices for unbound aggregate pavement layers.”, National Research Council, Washington, DC.
Tutumluer, E., and Thompson, M. R. (1997). “Anisotropic modeling of granular bases in flexible pavements.” Transp. Res. Rec., 1577(1), 18–26.
TxDOT (Texas Department of Transportation). (2010). “Test procedure for triaxial compression for disturbed soils and base materials.”, Austin, TX.
Uzan, J. (1999). “Permanent deformation of a granular base material.” Transp. Res. Rec., 1673(1), 89–94.
Vermeer, P. A. (1982). “A five-constant model unifying well-established concepts.” Proc., Int. Workshop on Constitutive Relations for Soils, A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 175–197.
Xiao, Y., Tutumluer, E., and Mishra, D. (2015). “Performance evaluations of unbound aggregate permanent deformation models for different aggregate physical properties.” Transp. Res. Rec., in press.
Zhang, Y., Bernhardt, M., Biscontin, G., Luo, R., and Lytton, R. L. (2014). “A generalized Drucker-Prager viscoplastic yield surface model for asphalt concrete.” Mater. Struct., 48(11), 3585–3601.
Zienkiewicz, O. C., and Taylor, R. L. (2000). The finite element method, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford, U.K.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 28 • Issue 8 • August 2016
Copyright
© 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: May 1, 2015
Accepted: Nov 25, 2015
Published online: Feb 29, 2016
Discussion open until: Jul 29, 2016
Published in print: Aug 1, 2016
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.