TITLE:
Rubblization: A Practical, Cost Effective and Sustainable Option for Repairing Deteriorated Airfield Pavement in the Empty Quarter Desert of Saudi Arabia
AUTHORS:
Waseem Ahmad Khatri, Mohammed Al Mehthel, Sami Al Ghamdi, Nezar Al Khalifa
KEYWORDS:
Rubblization, Reinforced Concrete Pavement, Test Pits, Reflective Cracking, Modulus, Rubblization Modulus, and Super Pave, Heavy Weight Deflectometer (HWD), FAARFIELD, Federal Aviation Authority (FAA)
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Civil Engineering,
Vol.11 No.2,
June
29,
2021
ABSTRACT: Rubblization technique has been extensively used to repair the damaged
concrete pavement and has proven successful in developed countries like the US
and Europe. It has not been fully adopted in developing region like the Middle
East and this paper presents the design and construction challenges posed while
assessing damaged concrete runway in empty quarter of Saudi Arabia. A number of design options for repairs for runway
pavement were considered and rubblization was chosen as a preferred
option for repair. This paper includes the consideration for the assessment and
adoption of the concrete rubblized modulus value using the falling weight
deflectometer, optimization of the tests for
the whole runway using the Heavy Weight Deflectometer HWD testing to
replace pits, safely working around the utilities, reasonable assumption of
drop height of the pavement and installation of utility conduits in the
rubblized layer. Findings of the paper demonstrates resolving technical
issues which are not very well covered in the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA)
EB-66 such as the additional test strips, minimum areas of rubblization for
assessment using test pits, drop in the height of concrete surface and fixing
of utilities in rubblized pavement. The case study demonstrates that the
rubblization can be successfully carried out in remote locations like empty
quarter of Saudi Arabia with carefully carried out detailed site
investigations, adopting correct assumed
design rubblization modulus, quality control using HWD, protection of
utilities while rubblizing and use of polymer modified asphalt for successful
project deployment.