Road pavements are subject to traffic and temperature variations producing cracks that propagate to the pavement surface, which reduces its life and decreases circulation comfort. Early identification of pavement cracks allows for suitable maintenance and rehabilitation decreasing life cycle cost and increasing pavement life. For the development of an approach to identify early cracking using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), a laboratory simulation of different types of cracking was carried out, using a GPR system equipped with a ground-coupled antenna with a 2.3 GHz central frequency. Additionally, numerical simulations were elaborated using a Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) method-based software package (gprMax2D). Field GPR measurements were also carried out on a cracked rigid pavement of a road section overlaid with an asphalt layer. The results of this work proved the capability of the GPR method to detect cracks in rigid pavements and allowed to develop an approach for application in the identification of early cracking in rigid pavements.

道路路面会受到交通和温度变化的影响，从而产生裂纹并传播到路面，这会缩短其使用寿命并降低循环舒适度。尽早识别路面裂缝可以进行适当的维护和修复，从而降低生命周期成本并延长路面寿命。为了开发一种使用探地雷达（GPR）识别早期裂纹的方法，使用配备了中心频率为2.3 GHz的地面耦合天线的GPR系统，对不同类型的裂纹进行了实验室模拟。此外，使用基于时差有限域（FDTD）方法的软件包（gprMax2D）进行了数值模拟。在覆盖有沥青层的路段开裂的刚性路面上也进行了现场GPR测量。