Characterization of Effective Tire Contact Area for Various Tread Patterns

Abstract

The effective tire-pavement contact area affects the relative damage of asphalt pavement and should be incorporated in both mechanistic and empirical response analyses of pavements. A new machine called ROTOCOM Wheel Tracker (RCWT) was designed and fabricated to capture the effective tire contact area apart from slab compacting, and conducting simulative laboratory wheel tracking tests. The main focus of this paper is laboratory measurement of effective tire contact areas for various tread patterns. Seven tire treads were selected for the footprint image analyses at five tire loads and four tire inflation pressures. An image processing MATLAB-based program was coded to calculate the contact areas of the 280 imprints obtained from both sides of the RCWT. Factorial analysis indicated significant effects of tire tread, tire load, and inflation pressure on the resulting contact area. Comparison between effective and traditional contact areas indicated that the current pavement design procedure with traditional circular contact area extremely overestimates the actual tirepavement contact area up to 92%.

Review of Research on Tire–Pavement Contact Behavior

“…However, measurements and modeling data show that the vertical stress distribution at the tire-pavement interface is not uniform, and the contact area is not regularly circular [29] or rectangular [33,34]. Tire pattern and pavement texture influences are ignored in this assumption, so researchers have conducted extensive research on contact geometric characteristics [35,36]. Pillai et al [37] used the tire footprint to determine the tire-pavement contact area and obtained two simple predictive equations for tire-pavement contact area based on tire deflection and tire and wheel dimensional parameters found on the tire sidewall, as shown in Equations ( 1) and (2), with an error between the calculated and measured footprint areas within 15%.…”

“…According to the 95% prediction band, the contact area of different tires also varies within a certain range. Muniandy et al [36] selected seven different tread-pattern tires for footprint image analysis, and their results showed that the tread pattern affected the tire-pavement contact area second only to tire load. Machemehl et al [53] used measured tire-pavement contact stress data to study the effect of tire pressure on pavements.…”

Investigation of Tri-Axial Stress Sensing and Measuring Technology for Tire-Pavement Contact Surface

“…A tire-road contact patch can be obtained using the thermal paper method or paint footprint method [5]. The effective tire contact area should be further corrected for various tread patterns [6]. The contact patches of special tires, such as tractor tires, are more complex [7].…”

The Analysis of Stone Trapping in Tire Tread for Various Road Conditions

“…These factors include the design of tire tread pattern (groove type), inflation pressure, tire load and mechanical properties of material. Muniandy et al [3] found that an increment in inflation pressure by 50% will decrease the actual contact area by 17% while an increase of tire load by 50% will increase the actual contact area by 42%. Fwa et al [4] had identified that an increase in groove depth from 1mm to 9.8mm could reduce the hydroplaning rate by 9.8%.…”