Browsing by Author "Miera-Domínguez, Helena"

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    Reinforcement of porous asphalt mixtures with recycled fibers from industrial processes
    (2025) Miera-Domínguez, Helena; Fuente Navarro, Christopher Alfredo de la; Lastra-González, Pedro; Indacoechea-Vega, Irune; Castro-Fresno, Daniel
    To date, most studies on asphalt mixtures reinforced with virgin fibers have shown promising results. In this regard, to make progress in this area, this work proposes the use of recycled fibres from industrial processes. The aim of this study is to evaluate the feasibility of improving the mechanical performance of porous asphalt mixtures by using recycled fibers as an alternative to polymer-modified bitumen (PMB). To this end, the study has been divided into three stages, the first of which involved the mechanical evaluation of mixtures reinforced with three different recycled fibers and selecting the best one using a multi-criteria analysis. In the second stage, considering the ability to increase the useful percentage of binder, performance has been optimised by testing different percentages of bitumen. Finally, the last step focused on optimising the mixture. For this step, various mechanical tests have been carried out: particle loss, water sensitivity, drainage, stiffness and fatigue, as well as a specific fuel resistance test and ravelling resistance by means of the steel brush test. According to the results, the recycled fibers called ECOFIBER showed the best results, although they significantly improved the mechanical behaviour of conventional bitumen mixtures, they did not match the performance of polymer modified bitumen mixtures. Specifically, the use of this type of ecofibers in the experimental mixture with conventional binder not modified with polymers, improves the abrasion resistance in the brush test and particle loss due to fuel resistance, reaching a performance comparable to that of the control mixture with polymer modified binder without the addition of fibers. However, in tests such as cantabro, water sensitivity, fatigue and modulus, the experimental mixture with fibers showed an improvement over the reference mixture, but did not match the performance of the control mixture with polymer modified asphalt binder.