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Best Practices for Road Weather Management Version 2.0

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Title:

Braking Traction on Sanded Ice

Abstract:

This paper describes an evaluation of traction enhancement on iced pavements using abrasives. The abrasives tested were five distinct gradations of sand built from a single host material. Four of the sands represented standard gradations as specified by the FAA, SAE, ASTM, and Transport Canada. Braking traction at a relatively fixed slip rate was measured with a full-size, self-contained instrumented vehicle. All tests were performed on an ice sheet inside a large refrigerated room. Results showed that coarse sands perform best on cold ice surfaces and that finer sands excel on warm ice. Sands with most of their grains about 1 to 2 mm in diameter performed well independent of ice temperature. The concentration of a sand on ice strongly influences the degree of traction enhancement, as does the temperature of the sand when applied to the ice. The results suggest that a mathematical expression could be generated that would relate sand type and concentration, along with several other influential parameters, to braking traction coefficient on ice.

Source(s):

U.S. Army Corp of Engineers Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, Transportation Research Record 1387. For an electronic copy of this resource, please direct your request to WeatherFeedback@dot.gov.

Date: 1992

Author:

Borland, Blaisdell

Keywords:


Pavement friction
Ice/Frost
Winter maintenance

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