CHAPTER 6 BITUMEN AND TAR Introduction Is the residue obtained from the distillation of crude oil.

crude oil. Bituminous binders, bitumen and tars are generally used in Civil Engineering in combination with mineral aggregates. The main area of application is road construction as stated in the relevant British standard, BS 594:1985. Significant quantities are used in hydraulics engineering and in roofs and floors. Small quantities are used as corrosion- resistant coatings for steel pipes and heavy cables. Bitumen a generic name, applied to various mixtures of hydrocarbons. Most common family of bituminous tars, asphalt and pitches. Bitumen dark brown or black solids or semi-solids which are found in natural state and also from refining of petroleum. Tar obtained when destructive distillations is carried out on wood, coal, shale or bone. Virtually all tar used today comes from coal. Pitch the solid or semisolid residue produces from partial evaporation or fractional distillation of tar

Characterization Bitumen are characterized by consistency varying from soft and fluid to hard and brittle. The viscous or the flow properties of bitumen are very complex and therefore tests have been formulated to measure the consistency of materials at temperature comparable to those encountered during the service life of the bitumen. The three flow tests properties that are commonly used are: Penetration test Softening-Point test Viscosity test i) Penetration Test A needle penetrates into a sample of the bitumen under gravity at standard conditions of temperature, load and time. The amount of penetration of the needle is measured in tenth of millimeter and this figure is called the penetration of the bitumen. The penetration is used to measure hardness. The harder the bitumen the more difficult it is for the needle to penetrate and consequently the numerical value of penetration is small. A 10 pen grade bitumen is harder and more viscous than a 200 pen grade bitumen. Usually a 10 pen grade bitumen are use for hard coatinggrade asphalts, 15 pen to 40 pen for roofing asphalts, and up to 100 pen or more for waterproofing asphalts.

ii) Softening-point Test Bitumen do not have a melting point. They become progressively softer as the temperature rises. The softening point is the temperature at which the bitumen attains an arbitrarily defined degree of softness. In the ring and ball test which is normally used for bitumen, two samples of bitumen are contained in metal rings and small steel ball is placed on top of each. The samples are immersed in a liquid bath whose temperature is raised at 5 degree per minute. As the bitumen soften they flow under the weight of the steel ball and each ultimately touches the lower bar of steel frame. The softening point is taken as the average of the temperature at which each of the samples touches the bar. iii) Viscosity Test Are conducted to determine the flow characteristics of asphalts in the range of temperature used during application. Some type of bitumen are liquid at normal temperatures whilst all types have to be brought to a liquid state to coat mineral aggregates. Viscosity is measured with the aid of gravity flow capillary viscometers. The viscosity is expressed as seconds at the test temperature.

i) Penetration bitumen is the most common type used in highway engineering. The individual grades are characterized by their penetration at 25 degree. In BS3690: Part 1: 1982, there are 10 grades ranging from 15 pen to 450 pen. However most road application are covered by 50 pen to 200 pen bitumen. ii) Oxidized bitumen Are used in roofing and hydraulic engineering and other specialized applications where harder but more flexible bitumen is desirable. These characteristics can be obtained by oxidizing penetration bitumen by blowing air through it at elevated temperature. Oxidized bitumen are characterized by two figures the means softening point and the means penetration. iii) Cut-back bitumen Is manufactured by adding a volatile diluents such as kerosene or creosote to penetration bitumen, usually 200 pen but sometimes 100 pen. This reduces the viscosity of the bitumen and lowers the application temperature. After spraying on a road or mixing with mineral aggregate the diluents starts to evaporate and the cut-back bitumen eventually reverts to the base bitumen from which it was made. This known as curing of the cut back. It can take up to a year depending on the climate and weather.

Types of bitumens Four types of bitumen are used in civil engineering: penetration grades, oxidized, cut-back and emulsions.

iv) Bitumen emulsion Are made by dispersing bitumen in the form of small drops of water. An emulsifying agent is added to prevent the drops of bitumen coalescing prematurely. The viscosity of bitumen emulsions is low that they can normally be used without any heating. When the bitumen emulsion has been applied the droplets recombine to from continuous film of the base bitumen which is usually 200 pen. This process is known as the breaking of the emulsion and the rate at which it happens can be controlled by modifying the manufacturing process. There are two types of bitumen emulsion, anionic and cationic. Bitumen emulsion are covered by BS 434:part 12:1984, which deals with both types. Part 1 list the properties of the emulsion while part 2 gives recommendation for their use. Anionic emulsion is a solution in which the aqueous phase is normally alkaline and has negative charge and cationic emulsion is usually in acidic emulsion and has a positive charge.

Tar There are 2 different types of tar volatilities: 1. Type S used for surface dressing, normally has higher volatility --> can harden quickly after spraying on the road. 2. Type C used for coating mineral aggregate lower volatility --> does not harden until the stone is fully coated. Tars were originally characterized by their STV viscosity, however a range of temperature was needed to cover the viscosities used and this lead to problems because the test temperature was not always quoted The Equiviscous Temperature EVT system (for tars) is the temperature at which 50 ml of tars flow out of the ST Viscometer in 50 seconds. Tar are characterized by their EVT in BS76. Characteristics of tar: more susceptible to temperature than bitumen, soft in summer heat brittle in cold temperature adheres more effectively to some type of road stone than bitumen. less durable but more resistant to the solvent effects of spilled oil and diesel fuel denser than bitumen so that a given volume needs a larger mass and dense tar surfacing is relatively difficult to lay even by machine.

Modified bitumen The most common additives was tar and a number of the bitumen mixtures involving tar are included in BS3690:Part 3:1993. The purpose of adding tar either: to improve adhesion to stone or to reduce durability in order to improve low-speed skid resistance. The purpose of these additives is to give bituminous road mixes having one or more of the following properties. Better workability Greater resistance to permanent deformation. Better resistance to cracking and to the effect of changes in temperature. The earlier additives included adhesion agents, rubber and sulphur. More recently attention has been given to adding petroleum resins of epoxy and PVC type. In general, the magnitude of the effect produced by an additive increase with the concentration which is turn, means higher costs Summary notes Bitumen: origin from petroleum. Occurs naturally alone or with minerals like asphalt, bitumen sands, rock asphalt. Most of the times is produced in Oil Refineries. Tar: origin from coal, wood, shale Most of the time manufactured by carbonization of coal gas, metallurgical coke smokeless fuel.

Comparison of bitumen and tar Property Origin Temperature susceptibility Adhesion to stone Weathering Effect - Hardening oxidation light - Durability -Skid resistance of road surface Bitumen Tar Modified Bitumen

Petroleum Coal Lower Higher Reduced Poor Less Better Better More Poor Improved Increase stability Increase flexibility Lower viscosity at high temperature.

Poor

Better

Resistance to oil Poor and fuel Availability Good

Better Poor

CRITERIA OF BINDER Be capable of being made sufficiently fluid, either by heat or to be sprayed or mixed with adequately coat the mineral aggregate. Become hard enough at normal temperature to resist deformation under traffic. Retain a degree or flexibility at low temperature such that it will not suffer brittle failure.