Verfahrensweise zur Berücksichtigung des thermo-viskoelastischen Materialverhaltens im Rahmen der rechnerischen Dimensionierung von Asphalt-befestigungen in Deutschland – Teil 2

Abstract

It is evident that climate change and the increasing traffic volume are having a detrimental effect on pavements, resulting in elevated levels of thermal and mechanical stress. The current mechanistic pavement design procedure in Germany according to the RDO Asphalt, accounts for these influences only incompletely. A thermo-viscoelastic model has been developed at TU Dresden that considers the behavior of asphalt more realistically. Results show that the service life of asphalt pavements regarding fatigue cracking is often significantly lower than calculated with RDO Asphalt approaches, especially at lower vehicle speeds and with a more precise consideration of the temperature profile in the asphalt layers. It has been shown that considering the viscoelastic behavior of asphalt leads to a substantial reduction in the pavement life with regard to fatigue cracking at speeds below 80 km/h. Therefore, in the future, the thermo-viscoelastic behavior should be taken into account in the mechanistic asphalt pavement design process, particularly for high traffic volumes and low traffic speed.