Research On The Characteristics Of Tire/Road Noise For Highway Concrete Pavement

Highway noise is one of the most pressing of the surface characteristics issues facing theconcrete paving industry. However, it is closely related to the structural characteristics oftexture for concrete pavement. This is particularly true in urban areas, where not only has ahigher population density near major thoroughfares, but also a greater volume of commutertraffic. There is no doubt that the pavement noise seriously affects people’s daily works andlives, even potentially harms to human mental and physical health. Therefore, how to find thequite and suitable pavement structures or texture types, as well as establish regionalboundaries and limit standards, have become the problems that should be consideredand solved urgently. This study based on a series of synchronous tests of roughness,macrotexture, microtexture and tire/road noise for numerous typical highway pavements, andseveral statistical analysis methods were used to study the characteristics for tire/road noise.The main research contents and results are as follows:（1）Both origin of linear regression and Pearson correlation analysis methods were usedto quantitatively describe the relationships between texture characteristics and tire/road noisefor highway concrete pavement. Studies have shown that relationships between roughness,texture depth and tire/road noise are beginning to emerge, it also found that there is no directrelationship between the friction and tire/road noise. That is possible to obtain amore“quiet”texture types without sacrificing the pavement safety performance.（2）When the A-weighted sound level evaluation was started, as SPSS frequencyanalysis method was introduced, in order to deeply statistical the sound level rangeand distribution trend of tire/road noise for kinds of concrete pavement. Studies have shownthat the sound pressure level was mainly distributed in the range of95~107dB (A) fortraditional pavement texture types, and which level about asphalt concrete pavement wasgenerally lower than the cement concrete pavement. Moreover, different mechanisms weredescribed respectively for tire/road noise about all kinds of pavement texture types.（3）Frequency domain and frequency composition were systematically studied by1/3octave spectrum analysis. Meanwhile, based on1/12octave spectrum analysis, influence ofgroove spacing and joint position on tire/road noise may be revealed progressively. Studieshave shown that peak frequency of tire/road noise is concentrated in the range of800~1250Hz, and the joints were significantly impact on the peak frequency.（4）K-means clustering analysis method was introduced, while the mean, median,minimum and maximum values for tire/road noise about kinds of pavement texture typeswere deemed analysis variables. In the initial classification of the tire/road noise, the degree of similarity and difference for each variable were expressed by the correlation coefficientand Euclidean distances. Studies have shown that tire/road noise ranges about17kinds ofconcrete pavement texture types were condensed into three categories. Correspondingly, withobvious similarities, the mean variances of tire/road noise were very small in the same cluster,but the mean variances were large and variant between different clusters.（5）Based on the concept of the regional border demarcation and K-means initialclassification of tire/road noise, according to the principle of boundary cohesion center（minimum, maximum cohesion center）did not overlap in nonadjacent areas, the boundarylimit for tire/road noise between1and2zones was primarily determined.Combined with the range of95%percentile in initial clustering2of tire/road noise, theboundary limit for tire/road noise between2and3zones was primarily determined.Accordingly, a limit reference standard was proposed for the new highway concrete pavement.That is to say, when condition was permitted, it does not allow that the test values of tire/roadnoise were founded in zone3for the new highway concrete pavement, especiallythe noise sensitive projects. Otherwise, it must through the way of joint repair orsmoothness recovery etc., to improve and reduce the tire/road noise level of highway concretepavement. Finally, the tire/road noise in zone3were promptly transferred to zone2, even betransferred to zone1.