Development of Innovative Techniques for the Instrumentation of Composite and Wet on Wet Pavement Sections at MnROAD

Composite and wet on wet concrete pavements are a promising solution for the economical, sustainable and durable construction and renewal of highways. Wet-onwet pavements consist of Portland cement concrete (PCC)-over-PCC, with a relatively thin PCC layer placed wet on a wet thicker layer made of a less expensive PCC mixture. A composite pavement here will be referred to as, a relatively thin hot mix asphalt (HMA) layer placed over a less expensive PCC mixture. In order to acquire knowledge on the performance of these pavements, three heavily instrumented pavement sections were constructed at the Minnesota Road Research Facility (MnROAD) in May 2010. The purpose of the instrumentation is to establish the magnitude of the environmental loads that develop within these pavements and the response of the pavement to both these environmental loads as we as traffic loads. Without this, the development of a rational mechanistic-empirical design process is not possible. The instrumentation of PCC pavements constructed in two lifts has never been performed before and presents a surmountable challenge. Discussed below are novel instrumentation techniques that were developed to overcome these challenges.