A RAPID TECHNIQUE FOR ROAD MACRO TEXTURE MEASUREMENT FOR HIGHWAY SURVEY VEHICLES

This paper investigates the feasibility of measuring road surface macro-texture depth using a non-contact technique. The method involves the use of a laser beam to scan the road surface and generate an image which is captured by a CCD camera and processed by equipment on board a moving vehicle. Laboratory tests performed using actual samples of pavement as well as models simulating different macro-texture depths are discussed. Tests on actual pavement samples are compared with sand patch tests. Finally problems associated with measurement from a moving vehicle are investigated and results obtained from measurements at different traffic speeds are presented. For the covering abstract see IRRD 887751.