A. Watn, Research Scientist, SINTEF Civil and Environmental Engineering, Norway
G. Eiksund, Research Scientist, SINTEF Civil and Environmental Engineering, Norway
A. Knutson, Head of Division, Norwegian Public Road Administration, Road Research Laboratory, Norway
Extract:
SINTEF, Civil and Environmental Engineering have performed a research project in two phases on non woven geotextiles in road constructions.
The first phase was a large scale laboratory test aimed to study the effect of non woven geotextiles on road deformations at cyclic loading. The second phase was a field test aimed to study the resistance against damage of the geotextiles during construction.
The project focused on the correspondence between properties from index tests and the observed behaviour. A clear correspondence was found between the initial tension stiffness of a geotextile and the deformation after cyclic loading. Low correlation was found between observed damage during construction and the evaluation criteria used for classification of geotextiles in Norway.
To take into account these findings we recommend a revision of the evaluation criteria. We also propose a survivability criterion based on a combination of deformation energy and stress-strain properties to cover the construction and lifetime requirements.
