Development of a failure criterion for asphalt mixtures under fatigue loading

The failure criterion defines the applicable region associated with the continuum damage model and is important in characterising the service life of asphalt mixtures. A proper failure criterion should consistently predict the failure of the material that reaches macro-fracture. A previously developed criterion that uses the viscoelastic continuum damage (VECD) model exhibits high variability and is considered to be inefficient because it requires calibration tests at different temperatures. In this paper, a new concept that involves released pseudo strain energy is introduced. This released pseudo strain energy concept focuses on the dissipated energy that is related to stiffness reduction only and is fully compatible and predictable using the VECD model. A characteristic relationship is found between the stable rate of pseudo energy release during testing and the final fatigue life of the same mixture, independent of strain amplitude and temperature. Based on these observations, a new failure criterion is proposed. The proposed failure criterion combines the advantages of the VECD model and this characteristic relationship, which both originate from fundamental mixture properties, and is able to predict the fatigue life of asphalt concrete mixtures across different temperatures and strain amplitudes.