Asphalt concrete pavements on commercial airports in the United States are constructed according to the Federal Aviation Administration Advisory Circular 150/5370-10B, Item P-401, “Plant Mix Bituminous Pavements.” This specification does not provide guidance for using the Superpave gyratory compactor in the design of asphalt mixtures. This thesis describes a laboratory study of hot mix asphalt (HMA) mix design for airport pavements that uses the Superpave gyratory compactor. These recommendations are based on comparisons of volumetric property measurements of HMA mixtures compacted using Marshall compaction and Superpave gyratory compaction.

Hot mix asphalt (HMA) is a composite material that exhibits a nonlinear response that is dependent on temperature, type of loading and strain level. The properties of HMA are highly influenced by the type and amount of the constituents used and also depend on its internal structure. In such a material the variable effects of the compaction process assume a central importance in determining material performance. It is generally accepted that the theoretical knowledge about material behavior during compaction is limited and it is therefore hard to predict and manage (the effect of) a compaction process. This work makes an attempt to address such a specific need by developing a continuum model that can be adapted for simulating the compaction of hot mix asphalt (HMA) using the notion of multiple natural configurations. A thermodynamic framework is employed to study the non-linear dissipative response associated with HMA by specifying the forms for the stored energy and the rate of dissipation function for the material; a viscoelastic compressible fluid model is developed using this framework to model the compaction of hot mix asphalt. It is further anticipated that the present work will aid in the development of better constitutive models capable of capturing the mechanics of processes like compaction both in the laboratory and in the field. The continuum model developed was implemented in the finite element method, which was employed to setup a simulation environment for hot mix asphalt compaction. The finite element method was used for simulating compaction in the laboratory and in various field compaction projects.