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Influence of Cementitious Stabilization of Subgrade Soil on the Distresses of Flexible Pavement Sections

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Abstract

The current study analyzed a total of 28 flexible pavement sections for evaluating influence of cementitious stabilization of soil on pavement distresses under different climate, traffic, and reliability level conditions. A total of three stabilizers, namely, 3% lime, 15% class C fly ash (CFA) and 15% cement kiln dust (CKD) were selected. A total of six types of pavement distresses namely, total rutting, asphalt concrete (AC) rutting, AC bottom-up cracking, AC top-down cracking, AC thermal cracking and international roughness index (IRI) values were predicted for a period of 20 years (240 months) using AASHTOWare pavement mechanistic-empirical (ME) design software. It was found that cementitious stabilization is effective in reducing only total rutting, bottom-up cracking and IRI under different climate, traffic, and reliability levels. The amount of improvement was found dependent on resilient modulus values of stabilized soil layer. However, no effect of cementitious stabilization of subgrade soil was noticed on top-down cracking and thermal cracking of AC layer. On the contrary, cementitious stabilization increased AC rutting of pavement. The maximum percent increase in AC rutting was found 6.4% for CKD stabilization in WY climate, 5.5% for CKD stabilization under 1000 and 5000 traffic levels, and 5.6% for CKD stabilization at a reliability level of 80%. Among all six distresses, stabilization was found most effective in reducing bottom-up cracking (or fatigue cracking) of AC layer under different climate, traffic, and reliability level conditions. Further, the level of improvement in bottom-up cracking due to stabilization was found most effective under warmer climate region and highest reliability level. Specifically, the maximum percent improvement in bottom-up cracking was noticed 61.3% for CKD stabilization in TX climate, 70.5% for CKD stabilization under 10,000 traffic level, and 92.9% at a reliability level of 95%. The cementitious stabilization of subgrade soil showed highest percent improvement in reducing IRI values under coldest temperatures (1.8% for CKD stabilization in WY climate), highest traffic level (1.8% for CKD stabilization under 10,000 traffic level), and lowest reliability levels (1.1–1.5% at a reliability level of 80%).

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Data availability

Data generated or analyzed during the study are available from the corresponding author by request.

Abbreviations

AADTT:

Annual average daily truck traffic

AC:

Asphalt concrete

BUC:

Bottom-up cracking

CBR:

California bearing ratio

CFA:

Class C fly ash

CKD:

Cement kiln dust

IL:

Illinois

IRI:

International roughness index

ME:

Mechanistic empirical

Mr:

Resilient modulus

PET:

Polyethylene terephthalate

PG:

Performance grade

RAP:

Recycled asphalt pavement

TC:

Thermal cracking

TDC:

Top-down cracking

TX:

Texas

WY:

Wyoming

ν:

Poisson’s ratio

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge graduate students, namely, Tejaswi Reddy and Harsh Chauhan, for assisting with the analysis and literature review.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Construction Management Program, Department of Technology, Campus Box 5100, Normal, IL, 61790, USA

    Pranshoo Solanki

  2. Foundation Mechanics LLC, 8604 W. Catalpa Av., Chicago, IL, 60656, USA

    Juan David Lopez

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Contributions

The authors confirm contribution to the paper as follows: study conception and design: Pranshoo Solanki; data collection: Pranshoo Solanki, Juan Lopez; analysis and interpretation of results: Pranshoo Solanki, Juan Lopez; draft manuscript preparation: Pranshoo Solanki. All authors reviewed the results and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Pranshoo Solanki.

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Solanki, P., Lopez, J.D. Influence of Cementitious Stabilization of Subgrade Soil on the Distresses of Flexible Pavement Sections. Int. J. Pavement Res. Technol. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42947-024-00441-z

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