Influence of Short-Term Aging on Rheological Characteristics of Non-Foaming WMA Binders

Abstract

The objective of this study was to conduct a laboratory investigation of rheological properties of non-foaming warm mix asphalt (WMA) binder after a short-term aging procedure. The conventional testing procedures such as viscosity, performance grade, creep and creep recovery, amplitude sweep, and frequency sweep were performed to determine the influences of non-foaming additives on asphalt binders. The experimental design included four binders and four non-foaming WMA additives. The test results indicated that, as expected, the non-foaming WMA additive can reduce the viscosity value of asphalt binder and thus decrease the mixing and compaction temperatures of the mixture. The failure temperatures of unaged and rolling thin film oven (RTFO) binders containing non-foam additives have a slight increase compared with the virgin binder, therefore improving the rut resistance of the mixtures. In addition, the creep recovery, amplitude, and frequency sweep tests show that the unaged and RTFO binders with Sasobit have a slightly higher complex modulus but exhibits lower creep compliance and phase angle than the binder containing other WMA additives.