Award Date

1-1-2005

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Civil and Environmental Engineering

First Committee Member

Moses Karakouzian

Number of Pages

328

Abstract

The quality control of the production of asphalt concrete and the subsequent placement for roadway pavement requires the extensive use of laboratory and field-testing. These tests determine mix properties such as gradation, binder content, air void content, and percent compaction. The amount of time it takes to perform these tests generates time delays in the information transfer from the laboratory to the construction and plant inspectors. The lack of timeliness of a test result may result in placement of an inferior product being placed. Thus, there would be a great benefit for the application of a rapid test method during the production and placement phase of construction. The use of non-destructive testing (NDT) is the means to this end; New ultrasound GMP(TM) non-contact transducers are introduced and applied to the testing of the laboratory prepared asphalt specimens for verifying the feasible for the use of non-contact ultrasound technology to measure material properties of hotmix asphalt, specifically, the bulk specific gravity. The key point is the use of non-contact transducer versus the standard surface contact method; The research used asphalt concrete specimens that were fabricated with varying gradation and asphalt cement proportions. The analysis consists of a statistical review of the data to detect changes in the sample test values for correlation to the known material property of the bulk specific gravity and the performance value of the Asphalt Pavement Analyzer rut depth. It was found that the use of the non-contact ultrasound measurement correlates with the HMA material property of bulk specific gravity to a degree that can discern changes in gradation, bulk specific gravity, and with the material performance rut depth value as determined by the Asphalt Pavement Analyzer; This work lays the foundation for future research for the use of the non-contact ultrasound technique as a viable tool for quality control application in asphalt concrete plant production and construction of asphalt concrete pavements.

Keywords

Application; Asphalt; Contact; Concrete; Feasibility; Materials; Noncontact Ultrasound; Nondestructive Testing; Ultrasound

Controlled Subject

Civil engineering; Geotechnology

File Format

pdf

File Size

9533.44 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

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