Numerical Analysis on the Mechanical Properties of the Concrete Precast Pavement of Runways under the Wheel Load

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper presents an investigation on the stress and displacement field distribution law of concrete precast pavement slabs under the aircraft wheel load. A theoretical model of the aircraft load acting on the pavement was established, taking into account the load distribution, pavement roughness, elastic layered theory and aircraft vibration model. Further, numerical simulation based on the finite element model of aircraft load pavement panels was conducted to investigate the influence of aircraft load acting on different positions. In general, this work has practical value. Minor revision is needed to improve its quality.

1.   Abstract: The abstract should be concise.

2.   Page 2, Line 53: Change "quick maintenance, maintenance, and laying of roads" as "quick maintenance, and laying of roads".

3.   Page 4, Lines 82-83: The sentence should be completed.

4.   Fig. 1 and Equations (1) and (2): The position of coordinate origin should be presented.

5.   Page 9, Lines 177-188 and Fig. 4: The mesh size of the finite elements should be added. How to simulate the steel bars? Explanation should be added. Besides, properties and parameters of the 3D surface-to-surface contact elements should be presented.

6.   Page 10, Line 202: The use of punctuation should be a concern.

7.   Page 10, Lines 195-202 and Fig. 5: According to text, the surface on both sides of the pavement structure is horizontal vertical constraints. It is very confusing. Hence, the boundary constraints should be clearly stated.

8.   Fig. 6(c): Whether to consider the contact between the adjacent pavement slabs without a dowel bar？

9.   Pages 8-12: The following article has reference value in the modeling and analyzing of the pavement. "Guo, T., Liu, Z. X., & Zhu, J. S. (2015). Fatigue reliability assessment of orthotropic steel bridge decks based on probabilistic multi-scale finite element analysis. Steel Constr, 11(3), 334-346."

10.   Page 20, Lines 364-365: Change "···finite element simulation numerical simulation." as "···finite element simulation.".

Author Response

Dear Dr. Ms. Jaya Deng,

RE: Manuscript ID: applsci-1924770

Title: Numerical Analysis on Mechanical Properties of Concrete Precast Pavement of Runway under the Wheel Load

We would like to thank Applied Sciences for giving us the opportunity to revise our manuscript. We also thank the reviewers for their careful read and thoughtful comments on the previous manuscript. We have taken carefully their comments into consideration in preparing our revisions, which have resulted in a paper that is clearer, more compelling, and broader. We revise the latest manuscript and highlight the changes by using yellow colored text.

If there were still some questions and inappropriate answers in the latest manuscript, please also accept our apologies for not being able to present the real contributions of the manuscript. We will continue to work hard in hopes that the editors and reviewers will be supportive of the publication.

We provide below with “Revision — Authors’ response” followed by our answers to the reviewers’ comments.

Dear Reviewer:

We are grateful for the reviewers' careful reading of our manuscript and insightful comments and suggestions to improve the quality of the paper. Our responses to the reviewers’ comments are listed in the following. The comments from reviewers are in black, and our responses are in blue. Revised portions were highlighted in the revised manuscript in yellow.

Point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments, please see the attachment.

Best wishes,

 

Corresponding Author: Lefan Wang

Sep. 20^th, 2022

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Good paper!!! Many researchers also did similar studies.

Further literature review and other related works should be included.

Many repeatable statements.

Use of complex sentences such as; Page 1, Line 6-11: Very long sentence. Try to make it simple.

The results are expected and nothing significantly different was observed.

Applying the temperature model to the developed FE might show different damage locations. The temperature effect is very significant in concrete slabs.

For precast concrete slabs, the zero stress temperature effect also needs to be considered.

Details about the boundary condition and the foundation support information are needed. The boundary condition needs to be evaluated.

 

What was the interaction between the dowel bar and slab?

 

Author Response

We would like to thank the Reviewer #2 for the thoughtful review of our manuscript. Those comments are all valuable and helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our research. We have taken thoughtfully into account these comments. The comments from reviewers are in black, and our responses are in blue. The explanation of what we have changed in response to the reviewers’ concerns is given point by point in the following pages. Revised portions are marked in yellow in the manuscript.

Point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments, please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

In this manuscript, the authors used the elastic layered Boussinesq theory and finite element in ABAQUS to analyze the mechanical contact behavior of an aircraft wheel load acting on the central slab, the edge of adjacent slabs, and the junction of adjacent slabs of precast concrete pavement of an airport.

In reviewer's opinion, the paper can be recommended for publication in Journal of applied science after addressing major revision considering the following remarks:

- The abstract is too long, it is better to remove the detailed description of results; however, it is better to highlight the novelty compared to previous researches.

- The presentation of the work written at the end of the introduction is also lengthy; some details should be removed and presented in the results analysis section.

- The quality of figure 1 need to be improved

- Usually the contact between a wheel and any surface is considered as a line contact and not a surface contact why in figure 1 the contact is considered as a surface contact?

- Line 182 the reference of the standard should be specified

- The material of the aircraft wheels (rubber hyper-elastic material) is not described on the presentation.

- The numerical model used in the simulation should be validated through a comparison with some real results.

- The efficiency and the sensitivity of the mesh elements used in the FE simulation should be verified.

- Authors said there is two type of stresses compressive stress and flexural-tensile stress, when the  aircraft wheel load was applied to the edge and joint of neighboring slabs however in many researches shear stresses have been remarked in this type of mechanical contact.

Author Response

We would like to thank the Reviewer #3 for the thoughtful review of our manuscript. Those comments are all valuable and helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our research. We have taken thoughtfully into account these comments. The comments from reviewers are in black, and our responses are in blue. The explanation of what we have changed in response to the reviewers’ concerns is given point by point in the following pages. Revised portions are marked in yellow in the manuscript.

Point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments, please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Please define FE contact properties and types.

Please also revise the paper thoroughly and remove complex sentences.

Please mention the temperature effect from the literature and clearly state somewhere that this is not considered in this study. A future study can be further investigated with temperature inclusion.

Author Response

We are grateful for the reviewers' careful reading of our manuscript and insightful comments and suggestions to improve the quality of the paper. Our responses to the reviewers’ comments are listed in the following. The comments from reviewers are in black, and our responses are in blue. Revised portions were highlighted in the revised manuscript in yellow.

Point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments, please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx