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PIARC (World Road Association), founded in 1909 and comprising 125 member governments from all over the world, is the global forum for exchange of knowledge and experience on roads, road transport policies and practices. With consultative status to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations, the Association is contributing to a stable and sustainable global development of the road and transport sector.

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International experiment to compare and to harmonize pavement texture and skid resistance measurement methods

This paper summaries the results of an International Experiment to compare and harmonise methodes of measuring pavement texture and skid resistance. This work was initiated in 1988 by the PIARC Technical Committee on Surface Characteristics (Committee C1). The tests were conducted in September and October 1992. 54 sites, having concrete surface with a wide variety of different characteristics, were selected between four main types of device, and evalutes the repeatability of the measurements. It then describes a proposed International Friction Index, based on three types of friction measuring systems: sideforce, breaking force with an unlocked wheel and braking force with locked wheel.

The four main objectives of the Experiment were met, sometimes more successfully than expected. resulting benefits include: the ability of road and airport authorities to adapt to a universal scale without having to replace thei present procedures, ability on contractors to adapt to specifications based on local control methods, better knowledge of skid resistance and improved safety.

Information sheet

  • Date: 1995
  • Domain(s): Road Assets Management / Road Pavements
  • Type: Bilingual English-French, published 1995-09, p. 22-37
  • PIARC Ref.: RR288-022
  • Number of pages: 16