An analytical method for evaluating highway embankment responses with consideration of dynamic wheel-pavement interactions

In this paper, a more realistic vehicle-road-ground coupling model is proposed to evaluate the dynamic responses of highway embankment with consideration of dynamic wheel-pavement interactions. The vehicle is modelled as a multi-degrees-of-freedom (MDOF) system, and the pavement and embankment are treated as two elastic layers resting on a poroelastic half-space soil medium. The dynamic wheel-pavement force is considered by introducing a Hertzian contact spring between the wheel and the pavement. The vehicles and the road-ground subsystem are coupled by displacement compatibility at the wheel-pavement contact area. The dynamic stiffness matrix method is developed to address the road-ground system, and priority is given to a simple formulation based on the principle of spatial Fourier transforms that are compatible with good numerical efficiency and provide quick solutions. Using a FFT (Fast Fourier Transform) algorithm, the numerical results are derived by introducing two typical vehicles. The results show that two peaks of the vertical responses can be observed with increases in the vehicle speed and the wavelength of the pavement unevenness because of resonance in the coupling system. The dynamic wheel-pavement force makes an important contribution to the responses of the embankment, and the influences of the pavement unevenness parameters and pavement rigidity on the dynamic response of the embankment are also significant.