ABSTRACT

Asphalt aging is recognised as one of the important factors causing cracking related failures in asphalt pavements. Asphalt aging occurs during production, construction, and service life of the asphalt surfaced pavements. Since constituents of asphalt mixtures are continuously increasing (increased recycled asphalt pavement (RAP), rejuvenators, compaction aids, warm-mix additives, fibres, etc.) and interactions between these constituents are complicating the mixture design process, relying solely on the volumetric mixture design is usually not resulting in asphalt mixtures with the highest possible performance. Thus, asphalt mixture test methods for rutting and cracking should be improved and incorporated into current mixture design methods to be able to develop more durable asphalt mixtures that last for their intended service lives. In this study, the most effective asphalt mixture long-term aging protocol was determined to achieve reliable semi-circular bend (SCB) test parameters that are correlated with in-situ cracking performance. The selected aging protocol will be integrated into the balanced mix design procedures that are currently being developed. Developed asphalt mixture design methods are expected to improve the longevity of asphalt materials, reduce life-cycle costs for agencies, and improve long-term road users’ comfort.

摘要

沥青老化被认为是导致沥青路面开裂相关故障的重要因素之一。沥青老化发生在沥青路面的生产、施工和使用寿命期间。由于沥青混合物的成分不断增加（再生沥青路面 (RAP)、再生剂、压实助剂、温拌添加剂、纤维等），并且这些成分之间的相互作用使混合物设计过程复杂化，仅依赖于体积混合物设计通常不会产生具有最高性能的沥青混合物。因此，应改进用于车辙和开裂的沥青混合料测试方法，并将其纳入当前的混合料设计方法中，以便能够开发出更耐用的沥青混合料，以达到预期的使用寿命。在这项研究中，确定了最有效的沥青混合料长期老化方案，以实现与原位开裂性能相关的可靠半圆弯 (SCB) 测试参数。选定的老化协议将被整合到目前正在开发的平衡混合设计程序中。开发的沥青混合料设计方法有望提高沥青材料的使用寿命，降低机构的生命周期成本，并提高长期道路使用者的舒适度。