Quality of asphalt mix (HMA) is one of the main factors that affects the flexible pavement performance. Use of poor quality mix and finding their consequences through pavement performance evaluation is often too costly. Therefore, the remedy is to evaluate the quality of the mix at the design stage of a project. In recent years, performance-based testing has gained popularity so that problematic mixes can be identified and eliminated. Asphalt Pavement Analyzer (APA) has been successfully used in recent years for evaluation of permanent deformation or rutting in both hot mix and cold mix asphalt specimens. In view of layered pavement systems encountered in practice, three-dimensional finite element models (FEM) can be used to relate the APA test results with the in-service performance of the pavement. The primary objectives of this study are to develop a finite element model to simulate the laboratory testing of asphalt mixes in APA for rutting and to relate the test results to basic material properties.
Abstract