Ground Improvement
2009
Musselburgh, Scotland
East Lothian Council
East Lothian Council
East Lothian Council
B6454 Pinkie Road Asphalt Reinforcement Trial
The site is located on a busy bus route
Transverse cracking apparent on unreinforced section
The trial site uses both Road Mesh™ and geogrid
Road Mesh was installed in two different overlay thickness
Prior to overlay, the pavement required constant maintenance
Problem
Heavy traffic volumes on the B6454 made it an ideal test site for asphalt pavement reinforcement. In the Autumn of 2009, East Lothian Council carried out a site trial with Road MeshTM on the B6454 Pinkie Road in Musselburgh.
Solution
Road Mesh™was installed within both 100mm and 250mm overlays. A 250mm overlay with a glass fibre geogrid reinforcement was also installed in an adjacent section to enable comparison with both Road Mesh™ and unreinforced control sections. Two years after construction all reinforced sections are performing well.
Maccaferri offers a range of reinforcement products for asphalt and unbound pavements. These range from extruded polymer geogrids to MacGrid AR glass fibre asphalt reinforcement and Road Mesh™. Whereas glass fibre reinforcement reduces reflective cracking, Road Mesh™, structurally reinforces the pavement, providing additional benefits of reduced rutting, shoving and fatigue cracking.
Road Mesh™ is made from hexagonal woven steel wire mesh. Every 160mm, a transverse steel bar is woven within the mesh, locking it into position. The steel is heavily galvanised (per BSEN 10244-2 Class A) to offer an expected design life of over 60 years. As it has a very open mesh, Road Mesh™ allows excellent contact between the existing pavement and the new overlay. This means that the bond between the two layers is not compromised by the presence of the Road Mesh™ reinforcement interlayer. The trial will be monitored over time to determine the performance of these reinforcement solutions.