Comparative Study of Cumulative Damage to Pavement Concrete under Splitting Tensile, Variable Amplitude Fatigue Loadings

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare the cumulative damage to pavement concrete under splitting tensile, variable amplitude fatigue loadings by splitting tensile and flexural tensile tests. The cumulative damage theories adapted in this study included the linear damage theory, the nonlinear damage theory, and the equivalent damage theory. The results were as follows. The sums of the cumulative damage were greater by the flexural tensile test than by the splitting tensile test, even though the difference between them was small in each load case. The sums of the cumulative damage at higher stress levels showed values farther from one than those at lower stress levels. This suggested that Miner's rule might be applied to plain concrete with little error, provided that the stress level remained low. The cumulative damage obtained by the nonlinear damage theory was closer to one than that obtained by the linear damage theory in all load cases except one. This indicated that nonlinear cumulative damage could consider the effects of the magnitude and the sequence of variable amplitude fatigue loadings. The theoretical results calculated from the equivalent damage theory were similar to the experimental results except in one case, even though the equivalent damage theory was simple. The results obtained by the splitting tensile test were equivalent to or better than those obtained by the flexural tensile test for application to the equivalent damage theory. Thus, the splitting tensile test and the equivalent damage theory could be used to estimate the damage and the remaining life of pavement concrete under variable amplitude fatigue loadings.