Enabling the use of alternative materials in road construction

Nunes, Manuel Clemente Mendonça (1997) Enabling the use of alternative materials in road construction. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.

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Abstract

Alternative materials represent an important potential source of aggregates for road construction. At present, their use remains limited owing to the abundance and low cost of high quality natural aggregates, low costs of landfill disposal and generally restrictive specifications for pavement materials. Nevertheless, their influence in relation to the primary aggregates is likely to increase in the future with the enforcement of more strict environmental regulations at national and European levels. The objective of this research project was to investigate a wide range of alternative materials and provide a practical framework for their assessment enabling pavement engineers to deal with most applications in road construction.

Initially secondary materials were assessed according to the present UK specifications and were found to fail the requirements in most cases. However, the current approach does not assess fundamental properties such as stiffness, resistance to permanent deformation, tensile strength, resistance to fatigue and the development of these with time, leading to an inadequate assessment of these materials. To advance towards the development of performance-based specifications repeated load triaxial and indirect tensile tests were used. For their performance the Nottingham 150x300 mm triaxial apparatus was used and an indirect tensile apparatus developed which evolved from the Nottingham Asphalt Tester used for bituminous materials. In triaxial testing, models used to study the resilient behaviour of granular materials were found to give good results for unbound but not for lightly-treated secondary materials. For these, a new resilient model was developed.

Testing and specimen preparation techniques together with performance classification systems were developed for both tests and recommendations for an overall methodology for the evaluation of secondary materials are presented. An application of this methodology was made to the study of thirteen mixtures to be considered for full-scale trials. The application of secondary materials in pavements was evaluated using analytical methods of pavement design which demonstrated the potential of these at levels in the pavement as high as the roadbase and the overall thickness reduction that may result.

Item Type: Thesis (University of Nottingham only) (PhD)
Supervisors: Dawson, A.
Keywords: Aggregates, Pavement foundations, Building materials
Subjects: T Technology > TE Highway engineering. Roads and pavements
Faculties/Schools: UK Campuses > Faculty of Engineering > Department of Civil Engineering
Item ID: 13522
Depositing User: EP, Services
Date Deposited: 14 Aug 2013 09:50
Last Modified: 16 Dec 2017 08:10
URI: https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/13522

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