Application Of Warm Mixing Technology in the New Field
Jan 15, 2024
The total mileage of highways is growing dramatically worldwide, and the highway industry in many countries has transitioned from the early construction to the maintenance stage. How to achieve reasonable and efficient recycling of the huge amount of waste asphalt mixtures generated by road maintenance and repair has become a key consideration for related industries. Besides, with the traditional strong foundation and thin surface pavement structure, the shrinkage cracks of the base and the resulting reflective cracks in asphalt pavement are common issues. In most cases, cracks cannot be effectively processed in a timely manner due to the high traffic pressure and large traffic volume. When the pavement performance drops to a certain level, it is necessary to overhaul or even rebuild the road surface, which undoubtedly increases costs.
The common asphalt pavement diseases and waste asphalt mixtures in the photos above have given rise to the continuous cold recycling equipment technology, which enables 100% recycling of waste asphalt mixtures. This technology can effectively improve the strength of the pavement after paving, and prevent pavement damage such as cracks.
Road coring inspection and asphalt mixture paving
Before 2014, D&G Machinery started researching on warm mixed asphalt mixtures and cooperated with the Research Institute of Highway Ministry of Transport to develop an intermittent asphalt foaming device (China patent number: ZL 2014 1 0066319.4）， which has been widely used in asphalt mixing plant (including recycling) ever since.
In order to meet the technical needs of new fields recently, D&G Machinery worked together with the Highway Research Institute of the Ministry of Transport in 2021 to develop a new continuous asphalt foaming device (patent number: ZL 2022 2 0853100.9), which has been successfully applied after being verified by a large number of engineering practices. For example, a cement mixing plant was retrofitted with emulsified asphalt equipment in Jilin, China in 2023, and transformed into a continuous cold recycling device. The trial production was successfully completed on May 14,2023.
01 The Technical Highlights of the Equipment:
- 1. The cement mixing plant is retrofitted with emulsified asphalt equipment, which is converted into a continuous cold recycling device. The equipment will be further upgraded later by adding foamed asphalt equipment, converting it into a foamed asphalt continuous cold recycling device.
- 2. D&G Machinery can also provide the complete set of foamed (emulsified) asphalt device, a kind of plant mixed cold recycling equipment.
- 02 The Advantages of Continuous Cold Recycling Technology:
- 1. The old road materials are utilized in a conservation-oriented manner, with a high utilization rate of RAP (Recycled Asphalt Pavement). The mixing at normal temperature brings significant energy-saving and consumption-reducing benefits.
- 2. It uses less virgin aggregate and helps reduce the over-exploitation of mine rocks.
- 3. The service life of the road can be effectively extended thanks to the technological characteristics of foamed asphalt, such as good encapsulation.
- 4. The high utilization rate of RAP results in less cost of engineering materials, while greatly cutting the total investment and production costs of the project.
- 5. The continuous production mode ensures continuous construction and large output, further improves construction quality, and better guarantees the quality and workability of on-site construction.
- 6. It has strong applicability and is suitable for various types of cement mixing plants.
- Nowadays, low carbon, less emission and recycling have become the strategic development trends in various industries. With its advantages of high efficiency, high quality and low cost, warm mixing technology is bound to be widely used in road construction and maintenance industries. D&G Machinery will always adhere to the concept of technological innovation as the driving force for development and go deeper, so as to contribute to green road construction, bring more advanced and innovative equipment to meet the needs of customers, and provide clients with more comprehensive overall solutions.