Moisture induced damage of hot mix asphalt pavements has a significant
economic impact in terms of excessive maintenance and rehabilitation costs. The
moisture sensitivity of an asphalt mix depends on the combined effects of material
properties, mixture design parameters, loading conditions and environmental factors.
Traditional methods to assess moisture sensitivity of asphalt mixes rely on mechanical
tests that evaluate the mix as a whole. These methods do not measure material properties
and their role in moisture sensitivity of the mix independently. This information is very
important to select materials resistant to moisture induced damage, or to modify locally
available materials to improve their resistance to moisture damage for economic reasons.
The objective of this research is to develop experimental and analytical tools to
characterize important material properties that influence the moisture sensitivity of
asphalt mixes.
Quality of adhesion between the aggregate and bitumen binder in wet and dry
conditions plays an important role on the moisture sensitivity of the asphalt mix. A part
of this research work was to develop the Wilhelmy plate method and the Universal
Sorption Device to measure the surface free energy components of the bitumen and
aggregate with adequate precision and accuracy, respectively. Surface energy of these
materials was used to identify parameters based on thermodynamics that can quantify
their interfacial adhesion and propensity to debond in the presence of water. The
thermodynamic parameters were shown to correlate well with the moisture sensitivity of
asphalt mixes determined from laboratory tests. Specific surface areas of the aggregates
were also used to account for the influence of mechanical interlocking at the micro scale.
In some mixes, chemical bonding also contributes to the adhesion between bitumen and aggregate. The use of a micro calorimeter was introduced in this research as a versatile
and fast tool to quantify the combined effects of physical and chemical adhesion between
these materials.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/5934 |
| Date | 17 September 2007 |
| Creators | Bhasin, Amit |
| Contributors | Little, Dallas, N. |
| Publisher | Texas A&M University |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation, text |
| Format | 3647899 bytes, electronic, application/pdf, born digital |
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