Exploring Damage Recovery in Bituminous Mixtures: An Analysis of Healing Technologies

Abstract

This research aims to study the recovery capability of bituminous materials at various levels of damage, taking into account the influence of several variables such as time, temperature, external forces, and rest periods. Thus, to explore the recovery due to healing phenomenon, different types of asphalt mixtures were tested under various conditions until their macro-failure by employing the University of Granada Fatigue Asphalt Cracking Test (UGR-FACT), after which various conditions were applied in order to induce their recovery (applying heating and external forces) under different treatment durations. In addition, to explore the role of recovery capability due to reversible phenomena, the asphalt material was tested using UGR-FACT by introducing different types of rest periods. The results indicated that among the variables that could affect the recovery capability of the material at the macro-crack level, the duration of the healing treatment has little impact, while the type and amount of binder could have more influence than temperature. Additionally, the presence of external forces during the healing treatment could increase the rate of recovery, but it is not sufficiently effective to recover the initial properties of the material. Thus, regardless of the type of treatment, the amount of fatigue life recovered in macro-damaged asphalt mixtures is low, prompting the suggestion that although applying these healing techniques can close the macro-crack, completely effective healing appears to be more difficult to achieve.