Tire/Pavement Strain Tensor Measurement With an Infrastructure-Based Approach

Studies are conducted at the LCPC for investigating the role of infrastructures in road safety. In this context, tire/pavement contact characterization is a key point for both vehicle and road surface optimization. For this purpose, car industry usually instruments dedicated cars with wheel dynamometers but this procedure doesn’t offer the possibility to observe a large set of vehicles in practice. Regarding road management, it has been chosen to use the infrastructure itself as an instrument for acquiring the complete 6-components stress tensor. In this paper, a new test apparatus allowing this is shown, using a mechanically isolated part of the pavement. Validations are presented on a variety of situations such as emergency braking and constant speed driving. Correlations with inboard vehicle sensors measurements and numerical models have been worked out.Copyright © 2005 by ASME