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Project

BITuminous Mortars: an Accelerated testing APproach (BITMA²P).

Bituminous mortar is considered as the missing link between binder and asphalt mixtures and has gained worldwide attention over the past decade. Investigating the mechanical properties of bituminous mortars can lead to a better understanding of the mechanical behavior of asphalt mixtures and therefore, the design and construction of cost-effective and sustainable road structures. The state-of-the-art tests to find the properties of these materials are cyclic-loading tests, which are time-consuming and use classical measurement instruments that only provide a global view on the mechanical properties of the whole sample. In this research, novel accelerated mechanical testing procedures are proposed that use the full-field vibration of the samples to estimate the complex modulus of elasticity, fatigue properties, and healing potential of the investigated bituminous mortars. Different optical measurement techniques are used and combined to design and validate these novel methods. These methods can be a big step forward in the road engineering community since the testing time is reduced from hours/days to a few minutes. This offers the possibility to conduct research on many more samples and improve the mixture designs. Furthermore, the full-field measurements with the combined optical systems can shed light on some of the highly investigated aspects of asphalt mixtures such as blending efficiency, self-heating, or the localized healing of microcracks.
Date:1 Oct 2021 →  30 Sep 2022
Keywords:OPTICAL MEASUREMENT TECHNIQUES, BITUMEN, MECHANICAL TESTS
Disciplines:Construction materials technology, Dynamics, vibration and vibration control, Signals and systems, Destructive and non-destructive testing of materials