Effect of Long-Term Aging on the Behavior of Batu Pahat Soft Clay-Modified Asphalt Mixture

Aging in the field is significantly influenced by the initial voids in the asphalt mixture, the intensification of the asphalt mixture under traffic, and the amount of heat applied to the mixture during production. Hence, this research is used to evaluate the effect of long-term aging on the behavior of soft clay-modified asphalt mixture. This study aims to evaluate the usage of soft clay powder, as a newly introduced material in asphalt mixture. Indirect tensile strength, indirect resilient modulus, and dynamic creep tests were conducted to determine and evaluate the performance of samples mixed using the Superpave system. The results obtained were perceived to be successful. As for the indirect tensile strength, the addition of batu pahat soft clay contributes to increasing the indirect tensile strength, especially when it was observed by using 4%, which gave better results than other soft clay percentages. In the resilient modulus test, Batu Pahat soft clay particles improved the fatigue and rutting resistance by 10.04%. While; in the dynamic creep test, the 4% soft clay value gave the best performance of evaluation works when it was conducted in a long-term aging process with the value of 0.14mm. More importantly, the evaluation of aging conditions noted that soft clay could resist and delay aging, promoting pavement durability. Also, this study was conducted to determine the most suitable and optimum patu pahat soft clay particles in the asphalt mixture and expectant to produce a new road material and to contribute toward producing cheap and effective asphalt mixtures for road construction