TRA, European Road Transport Research Arena, will be held in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, on 21-25 April 2008. One of the items on the programme is a Technical Visit, a study visit to a demonstration of VTI's unique HVS, Heavy Vehicle Simulator.

TRA 2008, arranged by the European Commission, is an important conference for researchers and other players in the European transport sector, such as road planners, vehicle manufacturers and fuel producers. During the week, there will be many presentations, a large exhibition and several study visits, all within the framework of European road research.

At the exhibition, the Swedish stand will be jointly arranged by VTI, the Swedish Road Administration and Vinnova.

One of the major study visits arranged on the last day of the week will be to a demonstration by the VTI Heavy Vehicle Simulator. The demonstration is presented as "a must for all those who are engaged on the design, construction and maintenance of road pavements".

After the test in Slovenia that will continue for about six weeks, the HVS will be further transported to Poland for four weeks testing within the EU funded SPENS project.

Read more about the HVS demonstration on the TRA website

The VTI Heavy Vehicle Simulator
The HVS is used for load tests and accelerated tests on road structures at full scale. With the machine, real loads from heavy vehicles can be simulated, and in this way a study can be made of how different types of road pavements stand up to heavy traffic.

HVS has such high capacity that more than one thousand load cycles can be applied per hour, which means that one year's heavy traffic can be simulated in only a week. Owing to the possibility to test and evaluate how traffic degrades various materials and structures, knowledge of road structures and road maintenance measures is improved. It is also possible to evaluate the service lives of various types of maintenance and reinforcement measures.

Read more about the VTI Heavy Vehicle Simulator