Compression Behavior of Large-Sized Tire-Derived Aggregate for Embankment Application

Abstract

Tire-derived aggregate (TDA) has been successfully used for highway embankment applications in the past. Previous applications mainly used small and medium tire sizes as TDA sources. There are no published test results in the literature regarding the compression behavior of TDA made solely from off-the-road tires (OTR). In this study, large-scale, one-dimensional compression tests are carried out to study the compression behavior of TDA from OTR as well as from passenger and light-truck tires (PLTT). Samples for the tests are prepared by varying the initial unit weights. The results show that there is a general trend of decreasing compressibility with increasing initial unit weight for both TDA sources. The compression test results are also used to compare compression behavior between the two TDA sources. It is found that the compression behavior of TDA from OTR and PLTT is more or less similar. Moreover, one-dimensional stress-strain regression equations were developed for TDA from OTR.