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Applying organo-silanes (OS) as water-repellent additives can enhance soil properties, crucial for use as moisture barriers in infrastructures like roads, landfills, and tunnels. This study used four soil samples and glass beads, treated with three OS products at dosages from 1:1 to 1:1000. Laboratory tests included contact angle, water drop penetration, and breakthrough pressure on 216 samples. Results showed increased hydrophobicity with higher OS dosages, with contact angles over 110° and Water Drop Penetration Test times above 3600s. However, effectiveness plateaued at certain dosages, indicated by electrical conductivity and pH changes. The primary factors (94.6% influence) were soil type, OS product, dosage, and drying condition, while reaction time, and leaching/washing had a minor impact (5.4%). Treated soils could sustain a hydrostatic head of up to 17 kPa. These insights aid in optimizing water-repellency treatments for soil performance and infrastructure durability in geotechnical applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To reduce the use of natural aggregates commonly used in base layers, constructing recycled aggregate base (RAB) layers has gained popularity. However, in the literature, there is limited information about the engineering properties of recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) materials with different gradations and the blends of RCA and recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) materials. There is also a lack of practice in using a mechanistic-empirical (ME) design method to optimize RAB layer thicknesses. In this study, several full-scale test cells were built with RAB and natural aggregate base layers, and the physical and engineering properties of the base layer aggregates were determined in the laboratory. For long-term performance evaluation of the cells built in the field, falling weight deflectometer (FWD) tests were performed, rutting measurements were taken, and soil temperature was monitored over a period of two years. An ME design procedure was used to optimize RAB layer thicknesses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pavement temperature is one of the most important factors influencing the performance of flexible pavements. The major components of the Earth's heat balance system are downwelling shortwave radiation (D-SWR) from the sun, downwelling longwave radiation (D-LWR) from the atmosphere, and upwelling longwave radiation (U-LWR) emitted by the warm pavement surface. The Pavement ME Design (PMED) software (AASHTO, 2015. Mechanistic-empirical pavement design guide–a manual of practice. Washington, DC: AASHTO) computes temperature distributions in the pavement over depth and time using algorithms originally proposed by Dempsey et al. (1985. Environmental effects on pavements: theory manual. US Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration). These algorithms are largely empirical, depend heavily on imprecise corrections for cloud cover, and in some parts contradict atmospheric physics. Improved models for the major radiation components proposed here include: (1) D-SWR values modelled by the MERRA-2 climate re-analysis product from NASA (Rienecker et al., 2011. MERRA: NASA's modern-era retrospective analysis for research and applications. Journal of Climate, 24, 3624–3648); (2) D-LWR modelled using the Idso (1981. A set of equations for full spectrum and 8-to 14-μm and 10.5-to 12.5-μm thermal radiation from cloudless skies. Water Resources Research, 17, 295–304) empirical parameterisation with a physics-consistent adjustment for cloud cover; and (3) U-LWR calculations without the physics-inconsistent cloud cover adjustment embedded in PMED. The D-SWR and D-LWR radiation models were evaluated via comparisons against ground-based radiation observations at 21 locations in the Solar Infrared Radiations Stations (SIRS) database. The MERRA-2 estimates of D-SWR, although not perfect, were found to agree substantially better than the current PMED models with the ground truth SIRS. The D-LWR fluxes from the Idso (1981. A set of equations for full spectrum and 8-to 14-μm and 10.5-to 12.5-μm thermal radiation from cloudless skies. Water Resources Research, 17, 295–304) parameterisation were also found to agree substantially better than the current PMED with the ground truth SIRS, with particularly striking improvements for the all-sky (i.e. including clouds) condition. A limited series of flexible pavement performance analyses were conducted to illustrate the potential practical impact of these radiation model changes. The new radiation models produced significantly higher pavement temperatures that lead to substantially higher total rutting, asphalt rutting, and bottom up fatigue cracking. These changes in distress magnitudes must be evaluated in qualitative terms only, as all analyses used the same field calibration coefficients for the distress models. The primary conclusion from this work is that the current radiation models incorporated in PMED are inaccurate and, in some cases, inconsistent with fundamental atmospheric physics. This can have significant impacts on predicted pavement performance. It is recommended that the current PMED radiation models be replaced by the new D-SWR, D-LWR, and U-LWR. New field calibration of the empirical distress models would be required after incorporating the new radiation models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]