Experimental Investigation of Fatigue Behavior for Polymer Modified Asphalt and Epoxy Asphalt Mixtures

Fatigue cracking is one of the main failures of the pavement structures. This paper presents the experimental investigation of the fatigue behavior for polymer modified asphalt and epoxy asphalt mixtures. One polymer modified asphalt mixture and epoxy asphalt mixtures at two different epoxy content in the binder are used in this study. The four point bending fatigue tests are conducted in strain-controlled mode at 10°C and 10 Hz. For each type of mixture, three levels of strain amplitude are applied in the test: 200, 300 and 400 µm/m. The test results allow determining the Wohler curve for each tested mixture. The experimental results show a better fatigue resistance of epoxy asphalt mixtures in comparison with polymer modified asphalt mixture. The slope of the Wohler curve is then obtained to evaluate the fatigue sensibility of each mixture. The nonlinearity phenomenon is also observed when analyzing the complex modulus and the phase angle at the beginning of the test.