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The effect of ageing on chemical and mechanical properties of asphalt mortar

Jing, R. (author), Liu, X. (author), Varveri, Aikaterini (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Asphalt mortar is a mixture of bitumen, filler, and sand. Mortar plays an important role in asphalt mixtures as it serves as the adhesive between the coarser aggregates. Due to the effect of bitumen ageing, the chemical and mechanical properties of asphalt mortar evolve with time. The mortar becomes more brittle and prone to cracking, thus...

journal article 2018

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Asphalt-rubber interaction and performance evaluation of rubberised asphalt binders containing non-foaming warm-mix additives

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Zhang, H. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Warm mix asphalt (WMA) technology has been increasingly utilised in rubberised asphalt pavements to reduce the production and compaction temperatures and the incidental fumes and odours. This study aims to investigate the high, intermediate and low-temperature performance of crumb rubber modified asphalt binders containing WMA additives. The...

journal article 2018

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Numerical investigation of rubber swelling in bitumen

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Crumb rubber modified bitumen (CRMB) has been utilized in the asphalt paving industry for decades due to its various benefits. The main mechanisms of bitumen-crumb rubber interaction include rubber particle swelling and chemical degradation. Crumb rubber modifier (CRM) swelling plays a dominant role in controlling the property development of...

journal article 2019

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Rheological, fatigue and relaxation properties of aged bitumen

Jing, R. (author), Varveri, Aikaterini (author), Liu, X. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Bitumen ageing has a significant impact on the mechanical performance of asphalt concrete. This study utilises dynamic mechanical tests (frequency sweep, fatigue, and relaxation) to investigate the effect of ageing on the viscoelastic characteristics of bitumen. As ageing progressed, a shift of the Black diagrams curves towards lower phase...

journal article 2019

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Effect of synthetic fibres on fracture performance of asphalt mortar

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), Daniel, Gerald C. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

The utilisation of synthetic fibres has been reported in the past showing enhancement of fatigue and thermal cracking resistance in asphaltic materials. However, the limited evidences about the benefits of these fibres in asphaltic materials at low material scales have been noticed. Also, the exact reinforcing mechanism of binding system in the...

journal article 2019

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Kinetic Viscoelasticity of Crosslinking Epoxy Asphalt

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), van de Ven, Martin (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Epoxy modification of asphalt binders has been recognized as a very effective technology to alter the chemistry of asphaltic materials in such a way that long-lasting pavement structures can be designed. However, the phenomena that are involved to build up the physico-mechanical properties of epoxy asphalt systems are still unknown. The focus of...

journal article 2019

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Laboratory and Field Aging Effect on Bitumen Chemistry and Rheology in Porous Asphalt Mixture

Jing, R. (author), Varveri, Aikaterini (author), Liu, X. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Oxidative aging takes place in bituminous materials during the construction and service life of asphalt pavements and has a significant effect on their performance. In this study, porous asphalt cores were obtained from field test sections each year from 2014 to 2017. The evolution of the properties of the field cores and the recovered bitumen...

journal article 2019

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Control the Crosslinking of Epoxy-asphalt via Induction Heating

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), van de Ven, Martin (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Induction heating driven polymerisation is an in-situ curing technique for epoxy-asphalt systems that maintains most of the advantages of temperature-driven polymerisation and it solves the need for longer curing time periods at lower temperatures before traffic can be allowed. In particular, induction heating can be utilised to accelerate the...

journal article 2019

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Ageing effect on chemo-mechanics of bitumen

Jing, R. (author), Varveri, Aikaterini (author), Liu, X. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Ageing has a significant impact on the chemical and mechanical properties of bituminous materials. In this study, Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectrometer and Dynamic Shear Rheometer (DSR) tests were utilised to investigate the effect of ageing on the chemical and rheological properties of bitumen. Bitumen films with thickness of 2 mm...

journal article 2019

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Evaluation of epoxy modification in bitumen

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

In epoxy-bitumen systems, temperature contributes to the development of physiochemical and mechanical characteristics during curing (chemical hardening) and at the long-term service (oxidative aging) of pavement structures. Hardening (i.e., chemical or oxidative controlled) is a complex phenomenon in epoxy-modified binders and the in-depth...

journal article 2019

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Evaluation of Organosolv Lignin as an Oxidation Inhibitor in Bitumen

Zhang, Y. (author), Liu, X. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Jing, R. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Poeran, Natascha (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Organosolv lignin, a natural polymer, has been used in this study as an oxidation inhibitor in bitumen. Particularly, the effect of oxidative aging on the chemical compositional changes and on the rheology of bituminous binders with organosolv lignin and the impact to inhibit oxidation in bitumen were evaluated. Firstly, after analyzing the...

journal article 2020

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The role of thermodynamics and kinetics in rubber–bitumen systems: a theoretical overview

Wang, H. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Zhu, Jiqing (author), Liu, X. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author), Erkens, S. (author)

Waste tire rubber has been incorporated into asphalt modification for decades due to its various benefits. There are two main mechanisms during bitumen–rubber interaction: rubber swelling and chemical degradation. This study surveys these two processes from the viewpoint of polymer science. The kinetics of rubber dissolution and...

journal article 2020

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Effect of laboratory aging on chemistry and rheology of crumb rubber modified bitumen

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), van de Ven, Martin (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Aging during construction and in-service substantially changes the chemical composition and physical properties of bitumen thereof influences the performance of asphalt pavements. The modification of bitumen by crumb rubber modifier (CRM) significantly increases the complexity of the aging mechanism and is expected to improve the aging...

journal article 2020

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Characterization of epoxy-asphalt binders by differential scanning calorimetry

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Asphalt binders incorporating different modifiers is a common practice but empirically driven in most of the cases. Therefore, the fundamental understanding of modification mechanisms in asphalt binders is needed to design polymer modified binders in a controllable manner, especially today in which new modification technologies are proposed....

journal article 2020

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Use of epoxy asphalt as surfacing and tack coat material for roadway pavements

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

This work presents an experimental program developed to evaluate the effect of epoxy-asphalt binder, used as replacement of bitumen, on the durability and fatigue life of an asphalt concrete mix. The use of epoxy-type binder as tack coat has been explored as well and thus experiments have been conducted to quantify the effect of epoxy tack coat...

journal article 2020

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Experimental characterization of storage stability of crumb rubber modified bitumen with warm-mix additives

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

One of the main drawbacks of crumb rubber modified bitumen (CRMB) is the storage stability issue. The storage instability of CRMB impedes its further application. This study aims to develop a robust methodology to evaluate the storage stability of CRMB binders using both mechanical and morphological tests. The effects of rubber contents (0, 5...

journal article 2020

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Fatigue performance of long-term aged crumb rubber modified bitumen containing warm-mix additives

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), van de Ven, Martin (author), Lu, Guoyang (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Recently warm mix asphalt (WMA) technologies have been introduced to rubberized asphalt mixtures to decrease the required construction temperatures and to alleviate the hazardous gas emissions. Rubberized asphalt pavements combining with WMA have the potential to improve the long-term pavement performance. This study aims to investigate the...

journal article 2020

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Experimental Investigation of Rubber Swelling in Bitumen

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Rubber swelling in bitumen, which is a diffusion-induced volume expansion process, plays a dominant role in the design of crumb rubber modified bitumen binders and their properties development. This study aims to investigate the kinetics of bitumen diffusion into truck tire rubber, the equilibrium swelling characteristics of rubber, and the...

journal article 2020

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Oxidative aging of epoxy asphalt

Apostolidis, P. (author), Liu, X. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Oxidative aging is responsible for the irreversible asphalt stiffening and embrittlement leading to asphalt pavements of increased susceptibility to fatigue and thermal cracking. In recent years, various flexible binders have been introduced in asphalt industry to produce long-life pavements and the epoxy asphalt binders are among them....

journal article 2020

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Micromechanical modelling of complex shear modulus of crumb rubber modified bitumen

Wang, H. (author), Liu, X. (author), Zhang, H. (author), Apostolidis, P. (author), Erkens, S. (author), Scarpas, Athanasios (author)

Crumb rubber modified bitumen (CRMB) can be considered as a binary composite system where rubber particles are embedded in the bitumen matrix. The bitumen-rubber interaction process (mainly swelling) significantly changes the mechanical properties of both bitumen and rubber phases. This study aims to predict the complex moduli of CRMB binders...

journal article 2020