EFFECT OF WASTE PLASTIC INCORPORATED THROUGH DRY PROCESS ON THE MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF ASPHALT MIXTURES

Abstract

As the world's population increases with urbanization, the use of plastic also increases, which is a major concern for the world. To minimize the problem created by waste plastic, much research is done. Utilizing waste plastic in construction, particularly for road applications, is one approach to lowering plastic waste. Rural roads are one approach where waste plastic can be used where light to medium traffic mainly occurs. The current investigation on the mechanical performance of asphalt mix is being conducted to reduce the quantity of waste plastic. In this study, waste shredded plastics PET and LDPE from different sources of India namely: Haridwar, Delhi, and Chennai are used in asphalt mixture through a dry process. Bituminous concrete with a nominal maximum aggregate size of 9.5mm is used. Optimum bitumen content (OBC) is determined as 6.1% with the variation of bitumen content of 5.7%- 7.2% with 0.5% of increment. The conventional and plastic modified mix were prepared with obtained bitumen content at three different percentages (6%, 8%, and 10% by the weight of the OBC) of plastic content. Different mechanical tests are performed; Indirect tensile strength, moisture susceptibility, resilient modulus, and Ideal-CT, which showed that adding PET and LDPE improved the moisture resistance, stiffness at both temperatures and fatigue cracking of asphalt mix compared to conventional mix. Statistical analysis showed that there is no significant impact of sources and plastic content on the performance of moisture resistance, and fatigue performance for LDPE but showed significant difference in case of resilient modulus at two different temperatures 25°C and 35°C as well as in fatigue performance with modified mixture from PET.