Road Surface Roughness

[kickflipjr]

Many of the roads hear are 50 year old concrete. Very rough with many cracks (some asphalt filled some not filled).

[rh77]

Originally Posted by psyshack

Course asphalt is a killer. And whats up with all this fine grooving they are doing on concrete hwy's here in Oklahoma... The tiny grooves suck big time.

They're doing that up here in KC too -- the grooves are supposed to prevent hydroplaning by channeling the water. Confused me because in dry weather it tosses the car left and right, which isn't the best of "stability", but the DOT found that on corners or low-spots, it prevents pooling.

What confuses me about Tulsa is the street numbering "system". What the heck is East 81st Street South? If I try to get around there without the GPS, I'm sunk (even though I'm there every 4-weeks -- you think I'd learn ).

[Bill in Houston]

Shoot, I've only been there once, and I know that East 81st Street South is on the southeast side of downtown, about 8 miles south of downtown. About a mile south of 71st, which is also called Memorial. Keep trying rh77! You'll get it!

[rh77]

Originally Posted by Bill in Houston

Shoot, I've only been there once, and I know that East 81st Street South is on the southeast side of downtown, about 8 miles south of downtown. About a mile south of 71st, which is also called Memorial. Keep trying rh77! You'll get it!

Ah, careful Bill -- 71st Avenue is "Memorial". But there's also a 71st Street. I would usually get my morning coffee at essentially the corner of 71st and 71st.

So, the place was on South 100th East Avenue. But there's also an East 100th Street South. Without a map and trying to "wing-it" led me to a grassy field in the middle of nowhere. It turns out the place was near the corner of 97th (Mingo) and 81st.

There are much worse places to navigate, but I'll admit to getting lost pretty easily.

[davidjh72]

Originally Posted by psyshack

Smooth concrete or asphalt,,, I cant tell the diff.

Course asphalt is a killer. And whats up with all this fine grooving they are doing on concrete hwy's here in Oklahoma... The tiny grooves suck big time.

Michigan's got some areas with grooved pavement. Hate it! Makes me want to drive faster just to get back to ungrooved pavement. Makes my Saturn feel like it's on ice even when in the dry. I've had an alignment not long ago. On straight, ungrooved pavement I can let go of the wheel and the car drives straight. Tires follow the not-perfectly-straight grooves, shimmying side to side. WTH! Takes alot of left/right compensating with the steering wheel to keep straight. Even worse with the strong crosswinds lately. Thanks, MDOT! NOT!!

Must be a traction enhancement pipe dream of the road commissions. Not effective, I don't think. Maybe to get drivers to slow down? Could be. Rain water in the grooves only increase the changes of hydroplaning. Melted snow that's turned to ice builds up in the grooves. A plow truck misses the ice in the grooves. Only rarely do the plows get right down to the pavement. They leave a 1/8 inch or more for the salt/sand trucks to go over. Until then, it's an ice rink.

[Bill in Houston]

Originally Posted by rh77

Ah, careful Bill -- 71st Avenue is "Memorial". But there's also a 71st Street. I would usually get my morning coffee at essentially the corner of 71st and 71st.

See? Perfectly simple! :-) I got a headache trying to makes sense of it. And I didn't like how they changed some to names vs numbers, like Memorial, Mingo, etc. Have you ever been to Salt Lake City? There, you can end up trying to find 2631 East 2400 South. Makes my head spin, even though I know it's supposed to be perfectly logical.

[psyshack]

Tulsa isn't hard to get around in... Its a grid. North/South streets are by name like Memorial, Harvard, Mingo, Garrnett and such. With a sub number and alpha Avenue. Street numbers run East/West. IE 71st, 11th, 101st. If your north of Admrial it would be 71st north.

Anyway,,, rh77. Lets do lunch sometime when your in town.

As for the roads. Ive dug around a bit on the concrete grooving issue. Ive got so frustrated with it. Its not even funny. Ive email the Okie folks for explanation and cant get one. Ive heard its for water control, traction. And the worst of all smoothing out bad work done by the construction crews. O and reliving surface tension so the road will last longer.

Either way the grooves ruin mpg. The tossing around of the car or motorcycle doesn't bother me. On a motorcycle you learn real quick to just let it jump around. Fighting it may very well result in getting yourself thrown down on the ground. As for cars. Soon as I hit the grooves it requires more throttle input to keep up speed. Never mind coasting... The bastards... Also since they have started doing this retarded grooving on the roads the wife and I drive daily. Our tire wear has went way up. And what gets me is where they groove them at. Never in a known hydroplaning area. Will be leading up to and on the down side of a over pass. Never the over pass its self that will freeze first.

It makes no sense to me at all. Best I can figure. Here in Oklahoma we have some over educated idiot in OKC ripping the tax payers off with fuzzy numbers. I would like to meet the person. Man or woman and give them a swift kick in the groin, and hope they don't breed.

psy

[trebuchet03]

I wonder if those grooves bring the static friction coefficient above 1.0. I see how they are necessary, but that would totally suck :P

I'm still waiting for photo voltaic road panels and driveways :P At full capacity only 5-10% of the road surface is actually covered by car :P

[GasSavers_Brock]

Check out
http://www.everytime.cummins.com/eve...Whitepaper.pdf
lots of good stuff. It was directed at truckers, but most of it carries over to us as well.

smooth concrete -12%
new concrete 0 - baseline
Asphalt finish +1%
Asphalt med +4%
Asphalt coarse +8%
chip seal +33%

oh I dislike chip seal. Only our big interstates are concrete up here in WI, I can see the inporvement in mileage on them.

[Peakster]

We have very few roads made with concrete up here (just a few select high-traffic intersections). You guys in the 'States have entire freeway systems made with concrete? I wonder why they don't do that up here (my guess is that the freezing and thawing would be murder on the roads)?