AN EVALUATION METHOD OF PAVEMENT BEARING CAPACITY WITH BURIED RIGID-PLATE LOADING APPARATUS

In snowy and cold regions, road and airfield pavements are much affected by the freezing and thawing of the ground. This causes damage in two ways; one is due to the frost-heaving itself, while the other arises from the decrease in the bearing capacity of base, subbase, and subgrade of pavements during the spring thaw. The method used to protect pavements from frost-heaving damages is to replace frost-susceptible soils with coarse materials to about 70% of the maximum fozen ground depth-this is the standard design for all classes of roads in northern Japan. With the bearing coefficients on each layer of pavement structure in Bibi Test Road, the author has attempted to calculate deformation coefficients for the evaluation of replaced materials with non-destructive method. Based on the measurements of the plate-bearing capacities on the subbase and subgrade of the Bibi Test Road, the moduli of deformation for the pavement layers have been calculated to evaluate the frost preventing replacement method for pavements in cold and snowy regions. Analysis of the pavement structures and conclusions of these investions are described.