Erapave Users Manual: Abubeker - Ahmed@vti - Se Sigurdur - Erlingsson@vti - Se
Erapave Users Manual: Abubeker - Ahmed@vti - Se Sigurdur - Erlingsson@vti - Se
Erapave Users Manual: Abubeker - Ahmed@vti - Se Sigurdur - Erlingsson@vti - Se
2012-05-24
Pavement Technology
Swedish Road and Transport Research Institute, VTI
581 95 Linköping, Sweden
Table of Contents
2
1. Introduction
The computation of the stress coefficients in multilayer elastic theory was optimized in
ERAPAVE to improve the performance by evaluating the stress coefficients at selected points
thus and using piecewise linear interpolation to compute the coefficients for other locations.
Moreover, Richardson’s extrapolation has been implemented to improve the performance and
accuracy of near surface responses.
ERAPAVE is written in C++ and the current version is only available for Windows 95 or
above.
2. Program description
The graphical user interface for ERAPAVE program is organized using set of tabs and menu
items within one main window. The subsequent sections present the detail description of the
tabs and menus in the program.
There are five tabs in the main window. Each tab is used to provide the information which is
required to perform the layered elastic analysis of pavements.
The user can add or delete a layer. The maximum number of layers the program can support is
15 and a minimum of two layers are required. A default three layer structure with
corresponding material properties is provided by the program.
If the nonlinear analysis option is chosen, a table to insert the material constants (k1, k2 and k3
according to Equation (1)) and ko (the coefficient of lateral earth pressure at rest) will be
3
activated. In the first column of this table, the layer identification number (between 2 to n,
where n is number of layers) must be filled in. The number of sublayers for nonlinear analysis
should be filled in the last column and a value ranging from 2 to 5 depending on the thickness
of the layer. Using very large number of sublayers affect the computation time.
Under the evaluation location, the user can insert the number of output locations and their
corresponding coordinates using Cartesian coordinate system as shown in Figure 1.
y
A(x,y)
yw
x
xw
In Figure 1, A denotes the output location; xw and yw are axle spacing and wheel spacing,
respectively. It should be noted that the origin (0, 0) of the coordinate system always lies on
the centre of one of the corner wheel at the surface. The z direction is positive downward.
Note: If the responses at a layer boundary are desired, the z coordinate should be inserted by
subtracting 0.0001 to obtain the responses at the bottom of the upper layer and by adding
0.0001 for responses at the top of the lower layer. By default if the z-coordinate inserted is the
coordinate at a layer boundary, the program returns the responses at the top of the lower layer.
Under the Load tab loading information such as axle configurations, contact pressure or tyre
inflation pressure, axle load, wheel and axle spacing’s are provided.
4
a
q
r
E1 , v1 z1
z2
E2 , v2
zn-2
H
En-1 , vn-1
En , vn
z ∞
Figure 2. Layered system with a uniform circular loading of radius a.
It is essential to note that the axle load that should be filled in must be the total axle load. For
example if the axle configuration chosen is tridem axle with dual wheels, the axle load will be
the wheel load of each wheel multiplied by 12 and similarly for other axle configurations.
The contact radius a is calculated internally by the program by using the axle load and the tyre
inflation pressure.
szz
x
sxz
syz sxz
y
syz
sxy sxx
sxy
syy
z
Figure 3. Normal and shear stresses.
5
The principal stresses are denoted as s1, s2 and s3 as the algebraic maximum, middle and
minimum respectively. Similarly, e1, e2 and e3 denote the principal strains. The principal
strains are saved into the text file which is described in the subsequent sections.
4. Using Menus
There are three menus in the user interface namely: File menu, Options menu and Help menu.
How to use each of them will be presented in the following sections.
Save results: the user can save the results of the analysis into a text file (*.txt) format into a
desired directory and using user provided file name. The results include summary of user
input, normal and shear stresses, normal and shear strains, deformations and principal stresses
strains.
Save data: the data that was used to perform a given analysis can be saved into data file
(*.dat) which can later be used to load and rerun the analysis. Figures 4 and 5 show the format
of data structure for linear and nonlinear elastic analysis of a pavement structure.
6
Figure 5. Example of a data file for nonlinear elastic analysis.
Exit: If the user would like to exit the program one can choose the Exit in file menu or simply
close using the × button in the top right corner of the main window.
A default value of 1e-6 tolerance is used for numerical integration, the user can change this
value based on the desired level of accuracy.
On the same dialog box there are three more edit fields that are activated only if nonlinear
analysis radio button is selected in the General tab window. The edit fields are the maximum
number of iterations for nonlinear analysis, tolerance for nonlinear analysis and the relaxation
factor.
k2 k3
3p τ oct
M rn +1 = ωM rn + (1 − ω )k1 p a
p + 1
(2)
pa a
7
Default values of 20, 1e-3 and 0.5 for maximum number of iterations, tolerance for nonlinear
analysis and relaxation factor, respectively, are used by the program. The user can change
these values if needed.
Help: the user can obtain the user guide for how to use the program.
About: information regarding the program can be found in this menu item.
5. Units
Only SI system of units is supported in the current version of the program and apart from that
the units the material properties and loading should be provided as shown in the graphical
user interface of the program. In generals the stiffness’s must be provided in MPa, layer
thickness in cm and axle loading in kN. For nonlinear analysis, k1, k2 and k3 should be
provided in such a way that the resulting resilient modulus is in kPa. The program performs
the conversion internally.
ERAPAVE-v01 can be downloaded from www.vti.se. The developers of the program are not
liable to any damage or loss that might arise due to the use the program.
Ahmed, A. W. and Erlingsson, S. Modeling of flexible pavement structure behaviour – Comparisons with HVS
measurements, 2012. Proceeding of 4th International Conference on Accelerated Pavement Testing, Davis,
California.
Erlingssson, S. and Ahmed, A. W. Fast layered elastic response program for analysis of flexible pavement
structures. Submitted to Road Materials and Pavement Design, 2012.
Erlingssson, S. Rutting development in a flexible pavement structure. Accepted for publication in Road
Materials and Pavement Design, 2012.
Huang, Y.H., 1968. Stresses and displacements in nonlinear soil media. The Journal of Soil Mechanics and
Foundation Division, ASCE, 94(1), 1-19.
Maina, J. and Matsui, K., 2005. Elastic Multi-layered analysis using DE-Integration. Publications of the
Research institute for Mathematical Sciences. 41(5), 853-867.
Timoshenko, S. and Goodier, I. N., 1951. Theory of elasticity. New York: McGraw-Hill.