Rheology of Asphalt Binder Modified with 5W30 Viscosity Grade Waste Engine Oil

Abstract

The pavement structure tends to shrink under low temperature conditions and cracks will appear upon crossing threshold binder stiffness. Decreasing the binder viscosity at such low temperatures, by introducing additional oil fraction (aromatics and saturates) in asphalt colloidal systems, may result in improved resistance to thermal cracking. A single multi-grade engine oil (5W30) was used in this study to analyze the rheological properties imparted to binders. Rotational Viscosity (RV) test revealed that after Rolling Thin Film Oven (RTFO) aging, fresh oil and waste oil have a similar effect on decreasing the viscosity of binder and construction temperatures, reducing them by 5~8 °C. Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) test results showed an abrupt increase of carbonyl concertation when fresh engine oil was used for rejuvenation while waste engine oil was less susceptible to oxidative aging. Dynamic analysis of modified binders proved that engine oil has better thermal cracking resistance but relaxation ability of binders and rutting resistance was impaired. Filtered waste engine oil resulted in a 35% decrement in the stiffness of binder compared to virgin asphalt after short term aging but upper Performance Grade (PG) was compromised by 1~3 °C with 2.5% oil inclusion. Unfiltered waste engine oil proved to have the least overall performance compared to fresh and filtered waste engine oil.

Influence of Waste Engine Oil Addition on the Properties of Zeolite-Foamed Asphalt

“…According to the FTIR analysis, Liu et al reported that the asphalt with the WEO viscosity decrease is the effect of reduced amounts of LMS and carbonyl functional groups [36]. Shoukat and Yoo pointed out that decreasing the binder viscosity by introducing additional oil fraction in asphalt colloidal systems, could result in an improved resistance to thermal cracking [18].…”

“…Rejuvenating agents, which restore the chemical structure of aged asphalt by providing lost aromatic constituents and reducing the overall viscosity of the binder, are used for improving the properties of mix asphalt with RAP [15,16]. One of the potential municipal waste materials that can be used to rejuvenate RAP is waste engine oil (WEO) from cars [17,18,19]. The structure of WEO resembles the molecular structures of asphalt with sufficient aromatic content, which leads to coherent bonding by altering the constituents and rejuvenating the aged asphalt [20,21].…”

Self-Healing Asphalt: A Systematic Bibliometric Analysis for Identification of Hot Research Topics during the 2003–2018 Period

“…Moreover, the use of waste cooking oil is an eco-friendly solution due to its great performance as a rejuvenating agent [ 110 , 111 , 112 , 113 , 114 , 115 ]. Similarly, waste mineral oils can be reused as rejuvenators without further refinement [ 115 ], although vegetal oil-based rejuvenators usually require lower doses than the ones based on petroleum to achieve similar performance [ 116 , 117 , 118 , 119 , 120 , 121 , 122 ]. Another green option to produce rejuvenators is the use of organic waste to obtain bio-oil [ 123 , 124 , 125 , 126 , 127 , 128 ].…”

Effect of Processed Oil on Asphalt Binder Properties

“…Furthermore, studies have shown that the addition of different types of oil reduces the dynamic viscosity due to the high penetration rate [ 10 , 11 ]. On the other hand, applying oil in aged asphalt binder reduces the stiffness significantly due to the recovery of elasticity of the asphalt binder by rejuvenation [ 12 , 13 ]. Therefore, processed oil is considered one of the oil compounds that is effective for modifying the viscosity of asphalt binders during construction operations, and can additionally increase stiffness at low temperatures to avoid thermal cracking defects.…”