Bearing Capacity of Roads, Railways and Airfields – Loizos et al.

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Influence of lateral confining pressure on flow number tests

E. Santagata, O. Baglieri & P.P. Riviera

Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy

M. Lanotte
Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA

M. Alam
Abasyn University, Peshawar, Pakistan

ABSTRACT:  The study described in this paper aimed to investigate the rutting resistance of bituminous
mixtures by means of flow number tests, with a particular emphasis placed on the analysis of the effects
produced by variations of lateral confinement. Two wearing course mixtures, one standard dense-graded
and one rubberized gap-graded, were employed in the experimental investigation in order to highlight the
influence of confining pressure on materials with significantly different bulk structure and rheological
properties of the binder phase. Flow number tests were carried out at a single test temperature and in
three confinement conditions on cylindrical samples compacted at two air void contents. Obtained results
suggest that confining pressure can significantly affect flow number values to an extent that depends on
mixture type and composition, indicating the importance of selecting proper testing conditions in order
to achieve a reliable performance-based ranking of materials.

1  INTRODUCTION tests (Kaloush & Witczak 2002, Hinislioglu & Agar

Accumulation of permanent deformation caused
by heavy and slow-moving traffic represents one
of the main distress types affecting asphalt pave-
ments. The presence of ruts or distortions on road
surfaces may jeopardize storm water run off, thus
increasing the possible occurrence of hydroplan-
ing events; moreover, it may lead to the premature
failure of pavement structures due to undesirable
wheel impact and dynamic load amplification
effects (Sousa et al. 1991).
Formation of ruts results from densification
and shear strain (Zaniewski & Nallamothu 2003,
Sousa & Weissman 1994) which are influenced by
several factors such as aggregate characteristics
(type, texture and gradation), binder rheology,
binder dosage, mixture volumetrics (Muniandy &
Huat 2006, Radziszewski 2007, Fontes et al. 2010,
Baghaee Moghaddam et  al. 2011, Xu & Huang
2012, Baghaee Moghaddam et al. 2014a, b).
It is widely recognized that evaluation of the rut-
ting potential of bituminous mixtures in the labo-
ratory represents a challenging task due to their
complex rheological behavior and to lab-to-field
scale effects (Blanc et al. 2015). Over the years, sev-
eral methods have been proposed by researchers,
although those which are more widely accepted are
wheel tracking tests and triaxial cyclic compression
2004, Tayfur et al. 2007, Fontes et al. 2010, Perra-
ton et al. 2011, BaghaeeMoghaddam et al. 2014a,
b, Katman et al. 2015, Morea & Zerbino 2015).
Wheel tracking testsare attractive since they are
capable of simulatingtraffic-related moving loads;
however, a non-uniform stress distribution is gen-
erated in the slabs, thus making these tests not suit-
able for the development of constitutive models
(Perraton et al. 2011, Sohm et al. 2012, Hofko 2015,
Yu et al. 2015). For this reason, triaxial cyclic com-
pression tests currently represent the most popular
option for the evaluation of the anti-rutting prop-
erties of bituminous mixtures (Kaloush & Witczak
2002, AASHTO 2008, Fontes et al. 2010, Katman
et al. 2015, Abdelfattah et al. 2016).
The importance of considering the behavior
of bituminous mixtures in the triaxial stress con-
figuration has been underlined by several studies
since it is more representative of actual conditions
occurring in the field (Brown & Foo 1994, De
Visscher et al. 2006, Taherkhani et al. 2007, Clec’h
et al. 2009, Hofko & Blab 2010, Roy et al. 2015b,
Yu et al. 2015,Gayathri et al. 2016, Zhu et al. 2016).
However, the selection of appropriate triaxial stress
paths still represents a crucial issue which needs
to be addressed thoroughly (Blanc et  al. 2015).
A contribution to this topic has been recently given
by proposing the adoption of a cyclic confining

237
pressure which was shown to have a significant
impact on materials response (Hofko& Blab 2014,
Hofko 2015).
The experimental investigation described in this
paper focused on the evaluation of rutting prop-
erties of bituminous mixtures by means of flow
number tests carried out in unconfined and con-
fined conditions. The flow number test is a dynamic
creep and recovery test in which a slender cylindri-
cal specimen is subjected to cyclic haversinepulse
loads followed by rest periods. Two wearing course
bituminous mixtures, one standard dense-graded
and one rubberized gap-graded, were employed in
the investigation. Obtained results were analyzed
and discussed with the specific goal of highlight-
ing the influence of lateral confining pressure on
the behavior of materials with significantly differ-
ent bulk structure and rheological properties of the
binder phase.
2  MATERIALS AND TESTING
consists in applying repeated compressive stresses
(equal to 600 kPa) to cylindrical specimens. A sin-
gle test temperature was adopted (equal to 58°C,
which corresponds to the high performance-grade
temperature commonly used in northern Italy), in
combination with four different confining pres-
sures (0, 14, 28 and 42 kPa).
Samples for the flow number test were prepared
in accordance with the AASHTO PP60 specifica-
tion. Over-height specimens (100 diameter, 150 mm
height) were first produced with the gyratory shear
compactor by employing the mixture mass needed
to reach the target value of air voids. Cores with
100  mm diameter were then extracted from the
center of gyratory samples using a diamond cor-
ing stand and thereafter subjected to trimming by
means of a masonry saw in order to obtain smooth
and parallel end surfaces. In order to evaluate the
influence of volumetric characteristics on mate-
rials response, specimens were compacted at two
different air void contents 5 ± 0.5% and 7 ± 0.5%.
Measurements were conducted in triplicate runs

Bituminous mixtures employed in the experi-

mental investigation were provided by a local Table  1.  Actual binder contents (Bactual) determined
contractor operating in north-western Italy. The from ignition tests, optimum binder dosages (Bopt) and
Dense-Graded mixture (DG) was produced with TMD.
siliceous aggregates and neat 50/70 penetration
Mixture code Bactual (%) Bopt (%) TMD (kg/m3)
grade bitumen. Target aggregate gradation was
defined according to Italian technical specifica- DG 4.8 5.0 ± 0.5 2477
tions for standard wearing courses (CIRS, 2001), GG 7.8 8.0 ± 0.5 2540
with an optimum binder dosage of 5.0% by weight
of dry aggregates. The rubberized Gap-Graded
mixture (GG) contained basaltic aggregates com-
bined with a commercially available asphalt rubber
prepared with a nominal percentage of crumb rub-
ber equal to 18% by weight of total binder. Target
aggregate gradation was defined according to tech-
nical specifications commonly adopted in Italy for
rubberized gap-graded mixtures (ARI, 2013), with
an optimum binder dosage of 8%.
Both mixtures sampled from the hot mix plant
were subjected to a preliminary laboratory char-
acterization in order to check the coherency of
their composition with job mix formulae. Binder
contents were determined by means of ignition
tests (EN 12697-39) which were followed by sieve
analyses of recovered aggregates (EN 933-1). Mix- Figure 1.  Comparison between actual and target aggre-
tures were also tested by means of the pycnometer gate size distributions.
method (EN 12697-5) to determine their theoreti-
Table 2.  Volumetrics properties of tested mixtures.
cal maximum densities (TMD), to be used for the
evaluation of volumetric properties of compacted Mixture code v (%) VMA (%) VFB (%)
specimens. Obtained results are reported in Table 1
and Figure 1, which prove a very good agreement DG 5.3 15.7 66.4
between actual and target composition. 7.2 17.4 58.6
Flow number tests were performed with the GG 4.8 23.2 80.0
Asphalt Mixture Performance Tester (AMPT) 7.4 25.3 71.0
according to AASHTO TP 79. The testing protocol

238
on the slender specimens for both compaction
conditions.
Volumetric properties of specimens after com-
paction (air void content v, voids in the mineral
aggregate VMA, voids filled with bitumen VFB),
determined according to EN 12697–8, are reported
in Table 2. A very good agreement between actual
and target air void contents was observed.
3  RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Examples of experimental data obtained from
flow number tests carried out on mixtures at differ-
ent levels of confining pressure (ranging between 0
and 42 kPa) are reported in Figure 2.
Figure 2.  Examples of strain evolution at various con-
fining pressures.
239
In general terms, the evolution of accumulated
axial strains as a function of number of loading
cycles is expected to show the presence of three
consecutive stages: a primary stage, in which the
rate of strain decreases as the number of loading
cycles increases; a secondary stage, characterized
by an almost constant rate of strain; and a third
stage (of tertiary flow), in which strain rate rises
dramatically, leading to failure. Flow Number
(FN) represents the number of loading cycles cor-
responding to the transition point between the sec-
ondary and tertiary stage and is considered as a
reliable indicator of the anti-rutting potential of a
mixture (Bonaquist, 2008; Witczak et al., 2002).
It was observed that the typical behavior
described above, referred to as Type I creep pattern
by some authors (Roy et al., 2015b), was exhibited
by specimens tested in unconfined conditions and
by those subjected to lower lateral confining pres-
sures (14 and 28  kPa). In the case of specimens
tested at 42 kPa, the tertiary stage was not reached
(Type II creep pattern), making the determination
of the FN value impossible. Although cell pres-
sure values up to 200 kPa have been used by other
authors (Sohm et  al. 2012; Hofko & Blab, 2014;
Roy et al., 2015a; Blanc et al., 2015), in this experi-
mental investigation the level of lateral confine-
ment was limited to 28 kPa since the specific focus
of the study was on FN assessment.
FN values obtained for mixtures DG and GG
plotted as a function of confining pressure are
reported in Figures3 and 4, respectively. A linear
trend in the semi-log scale is observed, indicat-
ing the increase of resistance to flow of materials
with the increase of imposed lateral confinement.
Such an evidence, which is consistent with expec-
tations, can be attributed to the “stiffening effect”
produced by the decrease of deviatoric stress that
reduces the rate of accumulation of axial strain in
the specimen and extends the secondary flow stage.
Moreover, due to the fact that confining pressures
are relatively low, the behavior of materials can be
Figure 3.  FN as a function of confining pressure (mix-
ture DG).

Figure 4.  FN as a function of confining pressure (mix-
ture GG).
assumed to be dilatant, i.e. characterized by a vol-
ume increase (Sohm et al., 2012).
For both mixtures, specimens compacted at the
lower target air void content (5%) exhibited higher
FN values than those compacted at the higher tar-
get air void content (7%) in all testing conditions.
Build-up of permanent deformation in mixtures
under repeated creep loading is the result of two
mechanisms related to shear flow and densification.
The first one is in most part governedbythe visco-
elastic characteristics of the bituminous phase,
while the second one is related to the bulk structure
of the material. Given that tests were performed
at the same temperature and loading frequency
(which therefore do not imply any variation of the
rheological response of the binder phase), for each
mixture type considered in the investigation it can
be assumed that the contribution of shear flow
to total deformation was the same regardless of
degree of compaction. As a consequence, observed
differences in creep response can be linked to the
occurrence of densification phenomena, which
were proven to be more pronounced in specimen
characterized by a more porous and weaker inter-
nal structure.
Further considerations can be drawn from the
comparative evaluation of the anti-rutting poten-
tial of mixtures DG and GG.
By referring to the mean FN values summa-
rized in Table 3, it can be noticed that the relative
ranking of mixtures varies depending upon the
considered combination of confining pressure and
volumetrics.
In the case of 5% air void content, the rubberized
gap-graded mixture showed a superior anti-rutting
potential with respect to the traditional dense-
graded material at all levels of lateral confinement,
while in the case of higher air voids (7%), this was
confirmed only at the highest confining pressure
(28 kPa).
The possible reason for these findings is that
at the lower air void content (higher degree of
240
Table 3.  FN values at 58°C for mixtures DG and GG at
various confining pressures and air voids.
DG GG
Confining pressure (kPa) 5% 7% 5% 7%
0 112 77 140 43
14 788 398 1100 358
28 8575 1852 17106 3552
compaction) creep behavior is strongly affected
by shear flow and therefore improved stiffness and
elasticity of asphalt rubber are emphasized, result-
ing in a reduced aptitude of the corresponding
mixture to accumulate permanent deformation.
At the higher air void content (lower degree of
compaction)densification mechanisms are predom-
inant and materials response is mainly governed by
internal structure and behavior of the mixtures was
found to be more susceptible to testing conditions.
In particular, the anti-rutting characteristics of the
gap-graded aggregate skeleton were highlighted
when lateral confinement reached a sufficiently
level for the promotion of stone-to-stone contact.
On the contrary, such a skeleton was more prone
to densification than the continuous one of the
DG mixture when tested in the unconfined state
or at the lower confining pressure, thus offering an
inferior resistance to permanent deformation.
4  CONCLUSIONS
In the study presented in this paper, rutting proper-
ties of a standard dense-graded and a rubberized
gap-graded mixture were investigated and com-
pared. The experimental program included flow
number tests carried out at a single test tempera-
ture and four confining pressures on specimens
compacted at two different air void contents.
From the analysis of obtained results the follow-
ing conclusions can be drawn:
– Depending upon the composition of the con-
sidered bituminous mixtures, there may be a
limitation to the maximum confinement pres-
sure which can be applied when focusing on the
determination of the FN value;
– Lateral confining pressure has a stiffening effect
as a consequence of the reduction of deviatoric
stress;
– Lateral confinement can affect the anti-rutting
ranking of bituminous mixtures based on the
results of flow number tests;
– At high air void contents (e.g. 7%) bituminous
mixtures with a non-continuous aggregate size
distribution can exhibit a better anti-rutting
 performance than that of dense-graded mixtures
only under the effect of higher confinement
pressures.
In summary, it was confirmed that proper
testing conditions need to be selected in order to
obtain a reliable evaluation of performance-based
mixture properties.
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