Improving the Moisture Damage Resistance of HMA by Using Ceramic Fiber and Hydrated Lime

Abstract

The Moisture damage is considered as one of the main challenge for the experts in the field of asphalt pavement design. The aims of the present study is to modify moisture resistance of the asphalt concrete by utilizing ceramic fibers as a type of reinforcement incorporated with hydrated lime. For this purpose, a penetration grade of the asphalt cement (40-50) was utilized as a binder with an aggregate of the maximum nominal size of 12.5mm and mineral filler limestone dust. A series of specimens has been fabricated by utilizing 0.50, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 percentages of ceramic fibers. For each of these contents, another subsequent group of specimens with hydrated lime with 0.0, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 percentages were moulded. For the addition of ceramic fiber and hydrated lime to the mixtures the dry method for ceramic fiber was adopted while for the hydrated lime, the saturated surface dry method was adopted. The results of this study have shown that the addition of 1% ceramic fiber with 1.5% hydrated lime recorded the highest levels of growth. Furthermore, the outputs of the tests used in this study have shown that the use of ceramic fibers resulted in a growth in the value of tensile strength ratio (TSR) and in the index of retained strength (IRS) compared with the control mixture. Maximum values for TSR were achieved at 1% ceramic fibers with 1.5 % hydrated lime.