Research on thickness problem of pavement asphalt layer based on energy dissipation

Aiming at the problems of low calculation accuracy and poor calculation effect of the traditional calculation method of the optimal thickness of pavement asphalt, a thickness calculation method of pavement asphalt layer based on energy dissipation was proposed. First, according to the energy dissipation theory, the changes of pavement in creep deformation zone and plastic damage zone under different temperature conditions were concretely analyzed, which laid the foundation for subsequent research. Then, proposing to take the lowest energy dissipation control of asphalt pavement as the principle, the energy consumption of asphalt layer was proposed and the optimal thickness of asphalt layer was calculated under the premise of considering the environment and other parameters. Finally, the method was verified by analyzing the changing conditions of the actual failure zone. The verification results show that when the thickness of the asphalt layer reaches the optimal thickness, the main creep deformation zone in the asphalt layer does not change significantly, and the scope of the actual plastic failure zone will be reduced to the minimum. At this time, the energy dissipation of pavement is the lowest, which conforms to the principle that the energy dissipation of the pavement is controlled at the lowest. Moreover, by analyzing the peak value of plastic dissipated energy and the changing situation of the actual plastic failure zone, it is concluded that the most suitable thickness range of asphalt layer is 10 cm similar to 20 cm. Therefore, through the research of the above, the amount of asphalt used is greatly reduced, and the energy consumption is reduced. (c) 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).