Civil Engineering and Architecture 12(1): 391-400, 2024 http://www.hrpub.org DOI: 10.13189/cea.2024.120129 Analysis of Doweled Multi-Slab Concrete Pavement System for Critical Stress and Dowel Slab Action Deepa Das 1 , Avijit Paul 2 , Dibyendu Pal 1,* 1 Department of Civil Engineering, North Eastern Regional Institute of Science and Technology, Nirjuli, A.P., India 2 Department of Civil Engineering, Central Institute of Technology Kokrajhar, Assam, India Received August 18, 2023; Revised October 7, 2023; Accepted October 24, 2023 Cite This Paper in the Following Citation Styles (a): [1] Deepa Das, Avijit Paul, Dibyendu Pal, "Analysis of Doweled Multi-Slab Concrete Pavement System for Critical Stress and Dowel Slab Action," Civil Engineering and Architecture, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 391 - 400, 2024. DOI: 10.13189/cea.2024.120129. (b): Deepa Das, Avijit Paul, Dibyendu Pal (2024). Analysis of Doweled Multi-Slab Concrete Pavement System for Critical Stress and Dowel Slab Action. Civil Engineering and Architecture, 12(1), 391 - 400. DOI: 10.13189/cea.2024.120129. Copyright©2024 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Abstract Cracking is considered one of the main reasons for the degradation of Pavement Quality Concrete (PQC) slab. The joints are provided along the PQC slab to restrict the formation of cracking in the PQC slab. In this study, a PQC slab with longitudinal, and transverse joints was modeled using a three-dimensional finite element-based software EverFE2.26. A multi-slab PQC (tandem axle dual wheel conditions) was modeled to take into account the practical conditions of the real pavement. An attempt has been made to consider the effect of varying surface temperatures on maximum tensile stress along with the other factors affecting the performance of the concrete pavement. The dowel group action was studied along with the dowel shear and vertical deflection with and without concrete shoulder. The critical stress was analyzed for a three-slab system with a tied concrete shoulder. It was observed that varying surface temperature does not affect the maximum tensile stress for a multi-slab system. A regression model was developed to estimate the maximum tensile stress for varying temperature differentials, slabs, axles, and dowel parameters. The R 2 value of the regression model was obtained as 0.863. The validation of the regression model showed that the differences between predicted and actual stresses obtained from EverFE2.26 were less than 10%. This model may be used directly to estimate the maximum tensile stress in the concrete pavement with varying parameters. However, further refinement of the model may be carried out for multi-slab systems with or without reinforcement and tie bars. Keywords Concrete Pavement, PQC, Multi-Slab System, EverFE2.26, Maximum Tensile Stress, Surface Temperature, Dowel Group Action 1. Introduction The Pavement Quality Concrete (PQC) slab is exposed to substantial traffic during its service life. PQC slabs are subjected to stress due to repeated traffic loads and environmental factors. The temperature surrounding the pavements is an important environmental factor that affects the performance of the pavements. Variation in temperature produces frictional and warping stress. Warping stress is produced due to the difference in temperature at the top and bottom layers of a concrete slab. The temperature difference is known as temperature differential (∆T). The frictional stress is produced due to the resistance between the bottom surface of the concrete slab and the soil beneath. According to Setiawan [1], ∆T had more impact than any other slab parameters on stresses in the concrete pavement. Khodke, and Patil [2] observed that the temperature produces 30.5% more stress compared to the traffic load. Critical stresses in a concrete pavement occur due to the combination of ∆T and axle loads (P). Concrete pavements are impacted by temperature changes through alterations in expansion and contraction movements and subsequently cracks form [3]. Cracks also