Field and laboratory performance comparison for asphalt mixtures with different moisture conditioning systems

The purpose of this study is to compare laboratory and field performances for dense graded asphalt mixtures. Control road pavement section was constructed in Black Sea Coast Highway. Marshall identical control samples produced in laboratory and core samples taken from wearing courses before the traffic opened were used. Three different moisture conditioning methods were applied to control laboratory and core samples. Mechanical properties of samples were evaluated with indirect tension, indirect tension strength and repeated creep tests. Indirect tensile strength test results for laboratory mixtures were found 1.22 and 1.30 times more in accordance with field samples at 10 °C and 20 °C respectively. Marshall samples gave higher resilient modulus for all control and conditioned mixtures. Repeated creep test results also proved the difference between laboratory and field sample performance. Laboratory samples protected their structural integrity along with the test duration and did not showed tertiary creep. It is concluded from this study that laboratory samples state expressly higher performance according to the core field samples.