ABSTRACT
Moisture damage is a problem that has plagued asphalt concrete pavements ever since their introduction in the late nineteenth century. Water infiltrates into the pavement structure and weakens its structural integrity by degrading the asphalt-aggregate adhesive bond, or by weakening the cohesive bond between the molecules of the asphalt binder itself. Despite being a topic of research since the 1930s, and with multiple methods currently available to test the moisture susceptibility of asphalt mixtures, it remains a critical issue till this day as results from the existing methods do not correlate properly with the field performance. The objective of this research is to introduce a new method for measuring the moisture susceptibility of asphalt mixtures. The tests presented within this paper will focus on studying the effect of the strain rate and asphalt film thickness, which are usually taken as constants for any mix design when conducting moisture susceptibility testing, on the strength and mode of failure of the samples. Testing was done on dry samples and this study will be followed up by another which includes moisture conditioning.
