Estimation of Characteristic Temperatures in Pavement Structure

Abstract:

By using measured data of temperatures in asphalt and concrete pavements placed at meteorological observation stations in Guangzhou, Ningbo and Datong cities as well as those in pavements at Zhenli and Jilai expressway jobsites over 1 year, the basic features and relationship among pavement diurnal temperature variation, diurnal average temperature and the ratio of positive temperature variations were studied, and the rules of variables mentioned above versus the pavement depth were summarized, and corresponding regressed formulas were provided; a generalized depth （α is the material thermal diffusivity coefficient）was introduced to eliminate the discrepancies caused by pavement materials, thus the methods and formulas by using characteristic temperatures on road surface to estimate diurnal temperature variation in pavements at any depth were issued, furthermore, the formulas were extended to circumstances of given diurnal temperature variation in pavements at arbitrary depth, and the model’s accuracy was verified by measured data in the 01-0101 section of Long-Term Pavement Performance (LTPP) program in USA. The results show that the methods and formulas proposed hereof are accurate enough to estimate the diurnal maximum and minimum temperatures in pavements at any depth, the standard deviations arising out of the formulas are not greater than 2.0℃, and the averages of standard deviations are less than 0.6℃, however, the formulas can meet the requirements of engineering practice.