FINITE ELEMENT METHOD IN STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF FLEXIBLE PAVEMENT

In this paper, we first compare pavement analysis methods, namely the finite element (FE) method with ABAQUS software and the theory of multilayer systems with KENLAYER software. Second, the FEs identified in the pavement analysis are used to study the effect of isotropic material features in pavement reactions to traffic loads. We found that the results of the FE analysis accorded with those derived from the theory of multilayer systems, with no significant difference among the mean values obtained using both techniques. The findings show that, the anisotropic properties of materials have no significant effect on the magnitude of pavement displacement under traffic loads, while have significant effect on the magnitude of tensile strain. Thus, the anisotropic properties of materials should be considered when modeling pavement structures.