Drying Shrinkage and Cracking Tendency of Concrete Pavement Mixtures with Variable Packing Densities of Aggregates and Paste Contents

Excessive drying shrinkage, and associated cracking, can lead to serious durability problem in concrete pavements and bridges. In the course of this study, the magnitude of drying shrinkage and cracking potential was evaluated for several concrete pavement mixtures as a function of packing density of the aggregate and paste contents. The results indicated that both, the shrinkage and the cracking potential depend on the volume of voids between aggregate particles (packing density), paste content of concrete mixture, and the paste-aggregate void saturation ratio.