TY - JOUR
T1 - Reduction of subgrade fines migration into subbase of flexible pavement using geotextile
AU - Kermani, Behnoud
AU - Xiao, Ming
AU - Stoffels, Shelley M.
AU - Qiu, Tong
N1 - Funding Information:
The financial and technical support provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (4400008014) (PennDOT) for this project is acknowledged. The authors thank Mr. Kerry W. Petrasic, Chief Geotechnical Engineer of PennDOT, for valuable comments and technical oversight. The authors also appreciate the professional project management by Ms. Heather Heslop, PennDOT Research Program Manager. The authors thank SKAPS Industries for providing geotextile product for this research. The Geosynthetic Institute (GSI) provided GSI fellowships to the first author. Mr. Dan Fura, laboratory supervisor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Penn State, provided technical assistance; his help throughout the project is highly appreciated.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2018/8
Y1 - 2018/8
N2 - Pumping in pavement is defined as traffic-induced migration of saturated subgrade fines into overlying granular layers or onto the surface of the pavement, negatively impacting the performance and service life of the pavement. The objective of this study was to assess the capability of geotextile as a separation and filtration layer in reducing subgrade fines migration. A one-third scale Model Mobile Load Simulator, an accelerated pavement testing device, was used to simulate the cyclic traffic loading on a scaled model of a flexible pavement. The results from three scaled pavement tests were compared to evaluate the effectiveness of geotextile separation and filtration in reducing subgrade fines migration. The three tests had identical configurations, except that a geotextile layer was placed at the interface of subgrade and subbase in one of the tests. The lab testing revealed that, under cyclic traffic conditions, the migration of subgrade fines into subbase was significant. However, using a geotextile at the subgrade-subbase interface significantly reduced the subgrade pumping. At the end of the test, the fines that migrated to the subbase, based on % mass of subbase, were 6.39% in the tests without geotextile and 1.81% in the test with geotextile. An approximately 30% reduction was observed in the amount of pavement rutting when using geotextile at the top of the subgrade. The subgrade soil migration in mass percentage increased with the traffic loading cycles, and more migration occurred in the bottom half than in the top half of the subbase. The study concludes that geotextile can be used as an effective means to reduce pumping of subgrade fines in pavement by providing both separation and filtration.
AB - Pumping in pavement is defined as traffic-induced migration of saturated subgrade fines into overlying granular layers or onto the surface of the pavement, negatively impacting the performance and service life of the pavement. The objective of this study was to assess the capability of geotextile as a separation and filtration layer in reducing subgrade fines migration. A one-third scale Model Mobile Load Simulator, an accelerated pavement testing device, was used to simulate the cyclic traffic loading on a scaled model of a flexible pavement. The results from three scaled pavement tests were compared to evaluate the effectiveness of geotextile separation and filtration in reducing subgrade fines migration. The three tests had identical configurations, except that a geotextile layer was placed at the interface of subgrade and subbase in one of the tests. The lab testing revealed that, under cyclic traffic conditions, the migration of subgrade fines into subbase was significant. However, using a geotextile at the subgrade-subbase interface significantly reduced the subgrade pumping. At the end of the test, the fines that migrated to the subbase, based on % mass of subbase, were 6.39% in the tests without geotextile and 1.81% in the test with geotextile. An approximately 30% reduction was observed in the amount of pavement rutting when using geotextile at the top of the subgrade. The subgrade soil migration in mass percentage increased with the traffic loading cycles, and more migration occurred in the bottom half than in the top half of the subbase. The study concludes that geotextile can be used as an effective means to reduce pumping of subgrade fines in pavement by providing both separation and filtration.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.geotexmem.2018.03.006
DO - 10.1016/j.geotexmem.2018.03.006
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85044077178
SN - 0266-1144
VL - 46
SP - 377
EP - 383
JO - Geotextiles and Geomembranes
JF - Geotextiles and Geomembranes
IS - 4
ER -