STUDY OF THE CEMENT PAVEMENT MECHANICAL RESPONSE USING THE SEMI-ANALYTICAL FINITE ELEMENT METHOD

Using the semi-analytical finite element method and MATLAB, a mechanical analysis program CP-SAFEM (cement pavement semi-analytical finite element method) for cement concrete pavements was developed. Based on various engineering cases, the analysis results from CP-SAFEM were compared with the current standards and ABAQUS. The results indicate that the calculation error between the CP-SAFEM and the standards was less than 1% for single-layer pavements, and approximately 6% for double-layer pavements. In addition, the error between CP-SAFEM and ABAQUS was less than 5%. With the same meshing scheme in the pavement cross section, the computation time of CP-SAFEM was only 1/6 of that of ABAQUS. Furthermore, the critical loading position was determined by the tensile stress of the panel. As a result, the CP-SAFEM was proven to have adequate computational accuracy and efficiency.