INFLUENCE OF CORROSION-RESISTANT DOWEL BAR ON MECHANICAL BEHAVIOR OF TRANSVERSE JOINTS IN CONCRETE PAVEMENT

Abstract

 In order to extend the service life of concrete pavement, we examined the possibility of improving the durability of transverse joints, which are weak parts of jointed plain concrete pavement. We tried to utilize dowel bars made from stainless and GFRP(Glass Fiber Reinforced Plastic) and investigated its load transfer ability with the scaled model experiments and 3DFEM. As a result, we found that in order to use GFRP dowel bars, it is necessary to increase its diameter from 25 mm to 38 mm so that the same load transfer ability as the steel dowel bar is obtained. Additionally, a secondary benefit of increasing the diameter was found to be a reduction in the stresses in the concrete around the dowel bar.