Evaluation of rutting potential for asphalt concrete mixes containing copper slag

Copper slag (CS) is a by-product of the copper extraction process, which can be used as coarse and/or fine aggregate in hot mix asphalt (HMA) pavements. This study used CS as a replacement of the fine aggregate with a percentage of up to 40% by total aggregate weight. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of CS on the rutting potential of the asphalt concrete mix using two methods. One method is based on the Dynamic modulus |E*| testing result. Actual pavement temperature data from a test section were used with the developed |E*| master curves. EverStressFE finite element program was used to perform a linear elastic load-deformation analysis for a pavement section and to determine the vertical resilient strain in a 40-mm HMA surface layer. The M-E PDG permanent deformation model was used with and Excel Visual Basic for Applications code to predict the accumulated rutting for different CS mixes for 10 million ESALs. The other method used the data from the flow number (FN) test. Based on the |E*| approach, the results indicated that adding 5% CS in the mix increased the predicted rutting from 0.59 to 0.98 mm at 10 million ESALs (increase by 68%). When 40% CS was used, rutting increased by more than 700% compared with the control mix. After analysing the FN results with the Francken model, the results indicated a decrease in FN as CS content is increased, indicating higher rutting potential. The decrease in FN ranged from 9% for 5% CS to 95% for 40% CS. The mixes containing up to 10% CS satisfied the minimum FN criteria for rutting. A calibration process for the M-E PDG distress prediction models that allows the use of waste and by-product materials such as CS should be considered in the future.