Investigation of the Impact of Tire Configurations on Different Pavement Structures Using Finite Element Analysis

Abstract

The impact of new generation wide-base tires (NGWBT) compared to conventional dual-tire assemblies (DTA) has been a controversial topic over the past years. Although NGWBT can improve fuel efficiency and ride quality, they may cause more pavement damage, due to the reduced contact area between tire and pavement. The degree of pavement damage caused by NGWBT and DTA varies based on pavement structure and environmental conditions. The goal of this research is to investigate the impact of these tire configurations (NGWBT and DTA) on four different pavement structures used in the City of Calgary, which has cold weather conditions. For this purpose, three-dimensional (3D) finite element (FE) models were developed and validated. The actual tire-pavement interaction, including the dimensions and shape of the contact area, as well as the non-uniform contact stress distribution over the contact area was considered for each load case (NGWBT and DTA). Using the 3D FE model, the strain values at critical locations were calculated and used to perform pavement damage analysis by considering bottom-up fatigue cracking and subgrade rutting. The results showed that, on average, the longitudinal strains at the bottom of the asphalt layer induced by NGWBT are 12.8–18.3% higher than the strains induced by DTA. In addition, considering a market penetration rate of 20% for NGWBT, the normalized combined damage ratios $${(\\mathrm{CDR}}_{\\mathrm{NGWBT}}/{\\mathrm{CDR}}_{\\mathrm{DTA}})$$\n for the strongest and weakest pavement structures investigated were determined to be 1.057 and 1.115, respectively, indicating that weaker pavement structures are more vulnerable to NGWBT.