Testing and Characterization of Compacted Asphalt Pavement Materials

ABSTRACT. This paper summarizes some key achievements and findings by the RILEM TC 206 ATB “advanced testing and characterization of bituminous materials” taking into account new developments in the field of bituminous road materials and test methods. These developments were triggered not only by an increasing variety of materials and requirements on the performance of bituminous pavement systems but also by environmentally driven innovations in terms of recycling and low temperature asphalt and new types of binders. Work on compacted asphalt pavement materials included interlaboratory wheel tracking tests on material from real motorways well as interlayer shear bond testing on material taken from specially constructed test sections. New developments in asphalt mixture testing, such as the application of image analysis techniques, were also taken into consideration. Results show that performance of bituminous mixtures must be considered also with respect to the whole pavement system. This is particularly true, e.g., in case of rutting tests, compaction and specimen preparation evaluation as well as interlayer bond properties. It was also found that test methods developed for one type of bituminous materials do not a priory apply to another type of bituminous materials and may even lead to completely misleading conclusions as compared to real life pavement performance.