Residual moisture from incompletely dried aggregates would most likely remain in the Warm Mix Asphalt (WMA) due to its lower production and compaction temperature, resulting in harmful effects on field performance. Dynamic modulus has been recognized as a parameter that reflects the overall behavior of asphalt mixtures and possesses promising correlations with field performance. This study aims to investigate the effects of moisture susceptibility of WMA on dynamic modulus and simulate the field performance with the aid of Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) software. Four distinct sets of WMA specimens were prepared as follows: 1. fully dried aggregates without moisture conditioning; 2. fully dried aggregates with moisture conditioning; 3. incompletely dried aggregates without moisture conditioning; and 4. incompletely dried aggregates with moisture conditioning. Simple Performance Test (SPT) was employed to collect the raw data of dynamic modulus tests and master curves were constructed from the reduced data using Hirsch model. The results show that moisture can negatively influence the dynamic modulus values and moisture conditioning had more effect than residual moisture from incompletely dried aggregates. Two types of distress, fatigue cracking and rutting, were analyzed in the simulation. Moisture can significantly decrease the resistance against rutting and to a lesser extent, the resistance against fatigue cracking.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:wpi.edu/oai:digitalcommons.wpi.edu:etd-theses-1110 |
| Date | 17 January 2012 |
| Creators | Xu, Yichao |
| Contributors | Tahar El-Korchi, Department Head, Rajib B. Mallick, Advisor, , Mingjiang Tao |
| Publisher | Digital WPI |
| Source Sets | Worcester Polytechnic Institute |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Masters Theses (All Theses, All Years) |
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