Laboratory investigation of rutting and fatigue in glassphalt containing waste plastic bottles

Abstract

Waste glass and plastic bottles are among the materials that have caused a wide range of environmental pollution, since they decompose too slowly. Therefore, the use of materials in recycling glass and plastic bottles (High Density Polyethylene) can preserve renewable resources and decrease their negative environmental effects. Considering the present of recycled High Density Polyethylene in the total weight of bitumen used in glassphalt mixture in the wet method, a laboratory investigation on the rutting and fatigue phenomena in High Density Polyethylene-containing asphalt mixtures and the effect of High Density Polyethylene on improvement of dynamic features of glassphalt is performed in the present research. The results of repeated load axial, indirect tensile fatigue, and indirect tensile stiffness modulus tests on 54 samples of asphalt shows improvement in elasticity and reversibility after unloading the asphalt samples with the optimum amount of 10% of material added to the bitumen. The test results also indicate that other properties of the asphalt samples such as modulus of resilience as well as creep and fatigue resistance (that lead to the durability of the asphalt mixture) are increased as well.