A Low Cost Equipment For Accelerated Testing of Pavement Materials

Testing the behaviour of different pavement materials under repeated application of loads has been recognized as very essential to predict the performance of pavements. Most of the methodologies /equipments used to carry out such tests involve huge sums of money both in terms of initial investment and recurring expenditure. Also, a large portion of the costs is in terms of precious foreign exchange. The present paper describes the details of an Accelerated Loading Facility that has been set up at the Department of Civil Engineering, Bangalore University, Bangalore. The facility is servo–valve controlled to apply repeated loads of various magnitudes and wave-forms at different frequencies. Results of some tests conducted have also been presented.