CONCEPTUAL UPGRADATION OF DESIGN

ASPECTS OF RIGID PAVEMENT

(A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN IRC:58-2002 & IRC:58-2011)
Introduction
In highly populated countries road transport is one of the most
efficient system which plays a vital role in its development
due to its various advantages such as flexibility, higher
connectivity etc. as because under practical consideration air
and rail transportations are not always available all over the
country, so road transportation becomes more vital because of
its ease and economic justification. Road transportation
mainly depends upon the quality of pavement considering
factors such as subgrade, traffic load, temperature difference,
pavement material, future maintenance etc.
Design of rigid pavements are based on certain parameters
such as traffic load, temperature difference, materials used for
pavement construction and some special considerations such
as swelling or collapse prone soils, slope instabilities etc. So
the scope of this study is limited to the study and
implementation of two principal parameters (temperature and
traffic load) affecting the design of rigid pavement using
guidelines as per IRC: 58-1988, IRC: 58-2002, and IRC: 582011 and discussion on their effects in the design aspect over
the pavement thickness and their comparison.
Guidelines for the design of the rigid pavements for Highways
were first published in 1974. The first revision of these
guidelines were made in 1988 after the extension of the legal
limit on the maximum laden axle loads of commercial
vehicles from 8160 kg to 10200 kg. In IRC: 58-1988, design is
based on Westergaards analysis. The second revision was
brought out in 2002 to include fatigue damage concept in
design. A computer programme, IITRIGID is used for the
computation of flexural stresses due to single and tandem axle
loads. Here design is based on Westergaards analysis and
Picket & Rays work. Presently in the third version IRC: 582011, design is based on the criteria of top down fatigue
cracking and bottom up fatigue cracking.

B. STRESSES DUE TO TRAFFIC LOAD AND

TEMPERATURE VARIATION WITH CRACKING
ANALYSIS:
In case of IRC: 58-2002 the design is done considering both
the effect of wheel load stress and temperature stress
separately where wheel load stresses are obtained with the
help of IITRIGID software and temperature stress is
calculated by taking Bradburys coefficient into consideration.
But in case of IRC: 58-2011 the design is done considering the
combined effects of temperature stresses and wheel load
stresses which are provided in the form of graphs in the code.
These graphs are analysed on the basis of Finite Element
Method with the help of a software IITSLAB-II.
The design is mainly based on Westergaards analysis
and Picket & Rays work as per IRC:58-2002 and as per
IRC:58-2011 the design is mainly based on the criteria of Top
Down Fatigue Cracking(TDC) and Bottom Up Fatigue
Cracking(BUC).
BOTTOM-UP FATIGUE CRACKING
Bottom-up cracking occurs during day time due to a
combination of loads on account of axle load repetition and
positive non-linear temperature differential between top and
bottom of concrete slab. Only rear axle is considered for axle
load spectrum. Flexural stress at the bottom layer is maximum
and cracks occur at bottom. Single axle causes largest edge
stress followed by tandem and tridem axle. Since the stresses
due to tridem axle are small, they are not considered for
cumulative fatigue damage analysis.

II. UPGRADATIONS AND CONCEPTUAL ASPECTS

A. TRAFFIC GUIDELINES:
In case of IRC: 58-2002, the guidelines are applicable to roads
having an average daily commercial traffic volume of more
than 150 whereas in IRC: 58-2011 that limit has been
extended to more than 450 (vehicles with laden weight
exceeding 3 tonne). IRC: SP: 62 may be referred for design of
low-volume Rural Roads.

Fig1. Curling of concrete slab during day-time (BUC)

At daytime when temparature of top surface is more
than bottom, top surface will try to expand more than bottom
surface thats why the slab has the tendency to have a convex
shape during the day hours. Due to restraint provided by the
self weight of concrete and by the dowel connections,

temparature tensile stresses are caused at bottom. As loss of

support occurs at the middle of the slab, we consider only one
axle load (mainly single or tandem) for the critical cracking
from bottom to top.
TOP-DOWN FATIGUE CRACKING
Top-down cracking occurs during the night time due to a
combination of loads on account of axle load repetition and
negative linear temperature differential between top and
bottom of concrete slab. Only first axle of
single/tandem/tridem rear axle units has been considered for
stress analysis along with front steering axle.

that time maximum day traffic repetitions occur. Similarly for

the six hour period between 12 AM and 6 AM during night
hours.
Again for top-down cracking, if the spacing between any
pair of axles is more than the spacing of transverse joints, they
are not expected to contribute in cracking, as during night time
most of the traffic load consists of trucks and those trucks
having wheelbase more than the spacing of transverse joints
can be neglected for fatigue damage analysis.
In IRC: 58-2011, we are dividing total traffic into two
specific cases: daytime and night hours and then into two
specific 6-hour intervals, excluding some of the heavy traffic
at night hours for fatigue damage analysis. Now the same
design can be done with lesser pavement thickness so it will
be more economic as well as specific.
CONCEPT OF IN-BUILT STRESSES

Fig2.Curling of concrete slab during night-hours (TDC)

At night hours, top surface is cooler than the bottom surface,
so the bottom surface will try to expand more than the top
surface and the slab will have a tendency to form a concave
upward shape. Due to restraints provided by the self weight of
concrete and by the dowel connections, temperature tensile
stresses are caused at top. As loss of support occurs at two
ends of the slab, we consider one steering front axle and first
rear axle of single/tandem/tridem for critical loading if they
are at the two ends of the slab at any instant.
From these two specific situations, we can say that these
two types of curling cannot occur at the same time. So the
designed pavement thickness calculated previously by
considering the maximium temperature difference in a whole
day may not be correct and may be less economic. For this
reason traffic has been considered separately for the day and
night hours.
EFFECTIVE HOURS AND EFFECTIVE
TRAFFIC
In the designing procedure for traffic intensity as per IRC: 582002 the average of day and night time traffic is considered
but in IRC: 58-2011 the total axle load repetitions (both the
single axle and tandem axle) are divided proportionally for the
day and night time and again both the traffic are divided
equally on the basis of 6 hours traffic. As we are considering
the critical situation when the effects due to traffic load
repetitions and temperature variations are maximum, we must
consider practically that in between 10 AM and 4 PM the
temperature difference is maximum for day time and also at

Inbuilt stress is considered in IRC: 58-2011 whereas there is

no provision for considering the effect of inbuilt stress in IRC:
58-2002. Practically it has been observed that the exposure of
fresh concrete to the Sun and high air temperature during the
hardening stage causes building of permanent curl in the
concrete pavements which is equivalent to the curl caused by a
negative temperature differencial of about 5 degree celcius.
We may consider the maximum positive temperature
differential during the day time unchanged for being in safer
side but during the night hours we must add that 5 degree
celcius with the maximum negative temperature differential to
consider the inbuit stress effect.
COMBINED ACTION OF LOAD
TEMPARATURE DIFFERENTIAL

AND

In IRC:58-2002 the maximum

temperature difference
between the top and bottom of slab observed during day and
night is used for design whereas the maximum temperature
difference during day-time and maximum temperature
difference during night-hours are considered separately for
the design. The reason behind this is that the maximum
temperature differential during the night is nearly half of the
day time maximum temperature differential and the variation
of temperature with depth is non-linear during the day time
and nearly linear during night time.
From all these discussions we can say that in day time or
in night time curling stressses are completely different form
one another so the traffic loading considerations are also
different as well as specific for individual cases. For these
reasons, traffic load repetitions and stresses should be
considered at a time as in IRC: 58-2011 and not separately as
per previous conceptions.

C. INTRODUCTION OF BONDED RIGID PAVEMENT:

Concept of bonded rigid pavement by eliminating polythene
and thus reducing thickness of pavement is introduced in IRC:
58-2011 but no such process is developed in IRC: 58-2002. By
eleminating the polythene separation membrane between the
concrete slab and dry lean concrete (DLC) subbase, the
monolithic action of the two layers can be exploited to reduce
the pavement thickness. A part of the thickness of concrete
slab (PQC) can be replaced with 150 mm of DLC so that the
combined flexural stiffness of that portion of pavement slab
layer and DLC layer is equal to or greater than the flexural
stiffness of the slab over the granular layer .
D. PERMISSIBLE STRENGTH OF CONCRETE:
For design of concrete pavement as per IRC: 58-2002, twentyeight days strength of concrete is being considered while in
case of IRC: 58-2011 ninety days strength of concrete is taken.
As during the initial period of the 90 days, the number of
repetitions of load is very small and has negligible effect on
the cumulative fatigue damage of concrete. So we can
consider 90 days strength for the design of concrete pavement.
Increasing the 28 days flexural strength by a factor of 1.10 is
recommended to get 90 days strength.
III. EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE DIFFERENCE ON
PAVEMENT THICKNESS

From the figure it is observed that with the increase in

temperature difference, pavement thickness is to be increased
to make the design safe but the variation is not linear.
The variation obtained by analysing IRC: 58-2011
regarding the Temperature Difference affecting pavement
thickness is different for top-down & bottom-up fatigue
cracking as shown in fig 4 & fig 5.

Fig 4 .Pavement Thickness versus Temperature

Difference for Top-Down Cracking (night-hours)
The variation is found out to be non linear with pavement
thickness needed to be increased with the increase in
temperature difference to make the design safe if all other
affecting parameters remaining constant.

As stated in the above paragraphs it is noted that for the

determination of pavement thickness, axle load stress and
temperature stress are being calculated separately in IRC: 582002 where as in IRC:58-2011 both the effects are considered
together. Thus the effect of temperature on both cases are
found out to be somewhat different.
For this reason a study is being done by the help of Excel
programming to find the effect of temperature difference with
a specified axle load spectrum and for a certain value of
modulus of subgrade reaction (Effective K).
The variation obtained by analysing as per IRC: 58-2002 is
shown in the fig 3.

Fig 5. Pavement Thickness versus Temperature

DifferenceFor Bottom-up Cracking. (Day-time)
From the above figure it can be stated that pavement
thickness varies linearly with temperature difference in case of
bottom up fatigue cracking to meet the safety criteria of
design.
Fig3. Pavement Thickness versus Temperature Difference

IV. CONCLUSIONS
As we all know that initial cost of rigid pavement is more than
that of flexible pavement, we must consider the economic as
well as safety aspects with greater sustainability of the
pavement. As per IRC:58-2011, the new concepts of day-time
and night-hours separated analysis, bonded rigid pavement,
ninety day design strength of concrete etc. may reduce the
thickness of the concrete layer (PQC) and the cost can be
reduced simultaneously. Due to these reasons we should
implement the design procedure as per IRC: 58-2011 in major
roads of India as early as posssible.
V. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are very much thankful to Dr. Sudip Kr Roy , Prof.,
IIEST , Shibpur and Mr. Dinesh Ganvir, Scientist , CRRI,
New Delhi for guiding and supporting us through out our
work.

II. REFERENCES
1.

IRC:58-1988, Guidelines for Design of Rigid

Pavement for Highways

2.

IRC:58-2002, Guidelines for the Design of Plain

Jointed Rigid Pavements for Highways, Second
revision

3.

IRC:58-2011, Guidelines for the Design of Plain

Jointed Rigid Pavements for Highways, Third
Revision

4.

Specification for Road and Bridge Works, Fourth

Revision, 2001 (MoRTH)

5.

IRC:15-2002, Standard Specification and Code of

Practice for Construction of Concrete Roads