Using Scanning Lasers to Determine the Thickness of Concrete Pavement
Publication: Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 134, Issue 8
Abstract
Due to limited budgets and reduced inspection staff, state departments of transportation are in need of innovative approaches for providing more efficient quality assurance on concrete paving projects. In Iowa, the current technique is to take core samples of the pavement, which is a labor intensive, destructive process. Due to these limitations, a limited number of cores are used to estimate the pavement thickness. Any method that can reduce or eliminate cores and increase the statistical accuracy of the thickness estimate will be beneficial. One method, which uses a laser to scan the surface of the base prior to paving and then to scan the surface after paving can determine the thickness at any point. Also, scanning lasers provide thorough data coverage that can be used to calculate thickness variance accurately and identify any areas where the thickness is below tolerance. The laser scanning methodology for this study involved the following: (1) investigating characteristics of the paving process; (2) using a laser scanner on three different sites; (3) processing the data to create clean surface models; (4) performing statistical analyses to determine thickness variability; and (5) summarizing the results.
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Acknowledgments
The writers would like to thank the Iowa Highway Research Board for sponsoring this research. Thanks are also extended to the writers' technical committee, who provided invaluable insights and guidance: John Adam, Chris Brakke, Mark Dunn, Todd Hanson, Kevin Jones, and Kevin Merryman.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 134 • Issue 8 • August 2008
Pages: 583 - 591
Copyright
© 2008 ASCE.
History
Received: Jul 26, 2006
Accepted: Nov 16, 2006
Published online: Aug 1, 2008
Published in print: Aug 2008
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