Evaluating Fatigue Life of Asphalt Mixtures Using Surface Free Energy Parameters

Fatigue cracking is one of the main and dominant distresses of hot mix asphalt (HMA) at moderate temperatures. This distress happens mainly because of two reasons: 1) Cohesive fracture in the asphalt binder or mastic phase, and 2) Adhesive fracture at the interface of asphalt binder and aggregate. Therefore, one of the main features of the materials used in asphalt mixtures, which affects their fracture type, is the surface free energy (SFE) of asphalt binder and aggregates. In this study, SFE components of aggregates and asphalt binders were respectively determined by universal sorption device (USD) and sessile drop (SD) tests. Also, to evaluate the effects of adhesive and cohesive parameters on the
fatigue life of asphalt mixtures, the samples prepared with different combinations of asphalt binder and aggregate were examined by indirect tensile fatigue test. Results showed that the asphalt mixtures with limestone aggregates and asphalt binder 85-100 had the highest fatigue life compared to the mixtures produced by other aggregates. This feature can be caused by three parameters: 1) Limestone due to the high specifc surface area has the highest adhesion with asphalt binder. 2) By using the asphalt binder 85-100, greater adhesion energy was created between the asphalt binder and aggregate, which increased the energy required for separating the asphalt binder from the aggregate surface and the occurrence of adhesion rapture distress. 3) By using asphalt binder 60-70 caused less signifcant free energy of cohesion in the asphalt binder which resulted in the increased possibility of distress in mastic