Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx

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Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Compatibility and rheological characterization of asphalt modified

with recycled rubber-plastic blends
Yuetan Ma a, Shifeng Wang b, Hongyu Zhou a, Wei Hu a, Pawel Polaczyk a, Miaomiao Zhang a,
Baoshan Huang c,⇑
a
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA
b
Research Institute of Polymer Materials, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, PR China
c
Edwin G Burdette Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA

h i g h l i g h t s

Recycled rubber-plastic blends were explored for asphalt modification.

The compatibility and rheological properties of binder blends were evaluated by DSR and optical microscopy.

The pre-combined rubber-plastic blends could improve compatibility and physical properties of the binder blends.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The use of recycled plastic and rubber for asphalt modification is gaining increasing attention for the
Received 24 August 2020 development of sustainable pavements. However, phase separation among the rubber, plastic, and
Received in revised form 12 October 2020 asphalt remains a major challenge for a large-scale field application. In this study, several approaches
Accepted 20 October 2020
were tested to improve the compatibility of the modified binder blends including the increase of recycled
Available online xxxx
rubber content, the addition of compatibilizer, and the use of pre-commingled recycled rubber-plastic
blends. The rheological properties and microstructure of the modified asphalt were evaluated by using
Keywords:
dynamic shear rheometer tests and optical microscopy, respectively. Furthermore, the compatibility of
Recycled rubber-plastic blends
Asphalt modification
the binder blends was characterized using the cigar tube test. Compared with adding plastic and rubber
Rheological properties independently or with additional compatibilizer, the asphalt modified with the pre-combined recycled
Compatibility rubber-plastic blends showed a significant improvement of the compatibility, resulting in enhanced
physical properties, which present a promising pathway to large-scale commercial applications of plastic
and rubber modified asphalt.
Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Plastics are a rapidly growing segment of municipal solid waste
(MSW). In 2017, data collected by the American chemistry council
showed that the plastic generation was 35.4 million tons in the
United States, which was about 13.2 percent of the total MSW gen-
eration. Of this total, 5.6 million tons were incinerated, and the
remaining 29.8 million tons of plastics were disposed as landfills
[1]. With the ever-increasing stock of waste plastics, studies
started to focus on the incorporation of recycled waste plastics into
construction materials, especially for asphalt modification, aiming
to improve the sustainability of pavements [2].
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: bhuang@utk.edu (B. Huang).
Plastics used for asphalt modification can be classified into ther-
mosetting polymers and thermoplastic polymers. Polyethylene
(PE) is one of the thermoplastic polymer plastics that is commonly
used in modern life, especially grocery bags, package film, etc. PE
can be mainly divided into two categories: the low-density poly-
ethylene (LDPE) with a density between 0.91 and 0.94, and the
high-density polyethylene (HDPE) with a density more than 0.94.
HDPE and LDPE are obtained by polymerization at high and low
pressure, respectively [3]. Polyethylene is a widely used modifier
since it can improve the service performance of the asphalt mix-
tures and benefit the sustainable development of the packaging
industry [4]. Awwad and Shbeeb investigated the properties of
asphalt mixtures with different percentage of HDPE and LDPE.
Their results indicated that the usage of this modified asphalt could
enhance the rutting resistance of the asphalt mixtures. The asphalt
mixtures modified with HDPE demonstrated higher stability

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2020.121416
0950-0618/Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article as: Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al., Compatibility and rheological characterization of asphalt modified
with recycled rubber-plastic blends, Construction and Building Materials, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2020.121416
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al.
compared to the ones modified with LDPE [5]. Ghuzlan et al. char-
acterized the rheological properties of asphalt binders modified
with different percentages of LDPE. It was revealed that the
increase of PE to asphalt binder ratio could improve the rotational
viscosity and complex shear modulus of asphalt binders [3].
Maharaj et al. probed the influence of different PE particles and
contents on the performance of binders. Their studies showed that
the PE particle sizes and contents are highly related to the rutting
resistance and fatigue cracking resistance [4]. Other types of waste
plastics including polypropylene (PP), ethylene-vinyl acetate
(EVA), acrylonitrile-butadienestyrene (ABS), polyethylene tereph-
thalate (PET), and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) were also applied for
binder modifications in existing studies [6–8]. In general, adding
the recycled polymers improved the binder properties, but some
of them such as PVC could result in harmful chloride emissions,
which were not suitable for binder modifications [9].
The crystalline segments of thermoplastics could serve as high
strength fillers in polymer modified asphalt, therefore, plastic
modified asphalt mixtures have the potential to offer excellent
resistance to permanent deformation [10]. However, the crystal
properties enable the plastic particles to remain intact in asphalt
binders, hence, the binder blends tend to have phase separation
and suffer a compatibility issue during asphalt mixing [11]. The
detachment of plastic particles from the asphalt binder also
restricts the use of plastic to modify asphalt binders [12]. Further-
more, the fatigue cracking and low temperature cracking resis-
tance of the asphalt mixtures could also be compromised, since
plastics would reduce the ductility of the asphalt correspondingly
[13]. Therefore, rubbers are usually mixed with plastic as a co-
modifier to segregate the crystal plastic particles for binder mod-
ification, aiming at improving the compatibility and mitigating
low temperature cracking potentials of the binder blends [14–
16]. Rubbers have the potential to swelling and degrading in
the asphalt at high temperatures [17]. Generally, natural rubber
could start to degrade at 143 °C, and the degradation was accel-
erated as the temperature exceeds 200 °C [18]. Ghavibazoo et al.
explored the mechanism of rubber modification of asphalt and
concluded that the interaction temperature plays an important
role in affecting the dissolution mechanism of the rubber parti-
cles, which contributes to an exchange of components in the
asphalt [19]. A study conducted by Wu et al. justified that a
higher temperature will increase the soluble content of rubbers
and destroy their crosslink structures [20]. Previous studies also
demonstrated that the rubber modified asphalt binders could per-
form good rutting resistance due to the increased viscosity and
elasticity at high temperatures [21]. Considering these properties
of rubbers, researchers started to probe the possibility of combin-
ing waste rubber and plastics for the asphalt modifications. Yu
et al. evaluated the engineering properties and environmental
concern of plastic-rubber asphalt in comparison with the con-
trolled Styrene-butadiene-styrene (SBS) asphalt. It was revealed
that the plastic-rubber modified asphalt is close to SBS asphalt
in terms of rutting, low temperature cracking, and moisture dura-
bility [22]. A large rubber-plastic ratio for asphalt modification
proved to enhance the mechanical properties of the binder blends
[13]. However, the settlement and incomplete degradation of rub-
ber particles during mixing would cause the disparity between
the asphalt and modifier, which limited the utilization of such
modified asphalt in the field [23,24]. Wang et al. pointed out that
the density disparity and interaction among the rubbers, plastics,
and asphalt need to be improved to acquire a stable binder blend
[25]. Previous studies proposed that the compatibilization and
storage stability of polyethylene modified asphalt could be
improved by incorporating degraded crumb tire rubbers and com-
patibilizers to form a thermoplastic elastomers (TPE)-like network
[26–28].
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Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx
Besides the conventional recycled plastic and rubber, there
exists one type of recycled rubber-plastic materials such as soaker
hoses, railway ties, and speed bumps, etc. In this type of material,
the melted rubbers are combined with plastic at high temperatures
in advance. This pre-combining process is not a simple mechanical
process, but a commingling process between plastic and partly
degraded rubber, which is expected to improve the compatibility
of the rubber-plastic binder blends during asphalt modification.
Therefore, the objective of this study is to characterize the compat-
ibility and rheological properties of the asphalt modified with mul-
tiple recycled rubber and plastic materials. The conventional
recycled plastic, crumb tire rubber, and one type of pre-
commingled recycled rubber-plastic blends, the soaker hose, were
included in this study. Polyethylene-graft-maleic anhydride was
used as a compatibilizer for asphalt modification. The rheological
properties and microstructure of the modified asphalt were evalu-
ated using dynamic shear rheometer tests and optical microscopy,
respectively. These tests were also used to characterize the com-
patibility of the modified binders after cigar tube tests.
2. Materials and experimental design
2.1. Raw materials
Fig. 1 shows the three types of wastes for asphalt modification.
One type of recycled rubber-plastic blends, the soaker hoses,
formed in the process through mixing and heating the partly
degraded rubber and plastic in the extruder, were collected and
cut into small pieces [29]. The waste plastic was obtained from
the used grocery bags and the waste rubber (140 mesh) was
received from Lehigh company by grinding the truck tire at ambi-
ent temperature. Fig. 2 shows the differential scanning calorimeter
(DSC) thermal analysis for the grocery plastic bags and the waste
hose. The melting point for LDPE ranges between 110 °C and
120 °C and around 135 °C for HDPE [29]. Both grocery bags and
rubber-plastic hose consist of a large proportion of HDPE. The
decrease in melting point is contributed to the addition of a small
amount of LDPE and the miscibility of rubber. Based on the integra-
tion of melting enthalpy, the composition of the waste hose con-
tains an approximate rubber-plastic ratio of 6.8:3.2.
PG 64-22 asphalt binder was used as a base binder for the
asphalt modification and a Styrene Butadiene Styrene (SBS) modi-
fied PG 76-22 was selected as a reference binder to evaluate the
properties of the binder blends. The basic properties of the two
binders are displayed in Table 1. Polyethylene-graft-maleic anhy-
dride serves as a compatibilizer between two immiscible polymer
blends. Compatibilizers are the macromolecular species with inter-
facial activities in the polymer blends, which play an important
role in impeding the interfacial disturbance on the polymers.
Therefore, the interfacial tension and the sizes of the dispersed
phase could be reduced and the fine phase morphology particles
were further stabilized [30].
2.2. Preparation of rubber-plastic modified asphalt
The recycled rubber-plastic blends with an adding ratio of 8%
wt were used to prepare the modified asphalt. For comparison,
three contents of tire rubber (4%, 8%, and 12% wt) and a fixed con-
tent of plastic (4% wt) were added independently into the base bin-
der. The composition and contents of the raw materials in the
modified binder blends are listed in Table 2. To prepare the con-
ventional plastic-rubber modified asphalt, the base binder was first
heated until fluids. Then, the rubber was mixed with asphalt and
stirred for 20 mins at a shearing speed of 12,000 r/min. Next, the
rubber modified asphalt was sealed with tinfoil paper and heated
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 1. Rubber and plastic wastes for asphalt modification; waste plastic, left; waste crumb rubber, middle; recycled rubber-plastic blends, right.

Fig. 2. DSC thermal analysis of the raw materials.

Table 1 stirring for 30 mins. It seems that the rubber-plastic blends can
Basic asphalt properties of the base binder (PG 64-22) and reference binder (PG 76- meltdown to certain tiny particle sizes regardless of the original
22).
blend size.
Asphalt type PG 64-22 PG 76-22
Viscosity at 135 °C, Pa.s 0.365 1.350
Flash point, °C 298 314 2.3. Experiment method
Specific gravity, 60/60°F 1.013 1.029
Polymer content, % – 3.4%
2.3.1. Rheological characterization
Dynamic shear rheometer (DSR) was used to evaluate the rheo-
logical properties of the binder blends at a high pavement service
at 180 °C for 2 h to degrade the rubber particles. Finally, the plastic temperature. The specimens with a diameter of 25 mm and a
with or without additional compatibilizer (6% wt of the rubber and thickness of 1 mm were sandwiched between the two plates. Shear
plastic) was added into the binder blends and stirred for an addi- stress was applied by the upper plate at different frequencies. The
tional 20 mins. For the pre-commingled rubber-plastic modified complex shear modulus (jG j) and phase angle (d) were automati-
asphalt, the recycled rubber-plastic blends were cut into small cally collected by the software. Two types of DSR tests including
pieces and directly added into the asphalt binder. The blends were the frequency sweep test and the temperature sweep test were
conditioned in the oven at 180 °C for 2 h, followed by mechanical performed for all the binder blends. Frequency sweep tests were

Table 2
The composition and contents of materials in each binder blends.

Binder blends Base (g) Rubber (g) Plastic (g) Compatibilizer (g) Labels in the graph
B (PG 64–22) 200 – – – 6422
B + 4%P 192 – 8 – 4P
B + 4%P + 4%R 184 8 8 – 4P4R
B + 4%P + 8%R 176 16 8 – 4P8R
B + 4%P + 12%R 168 24 8 – 4P12R
B + 4%P + 4%R (compatibilizer) 184 8 8 0.96 4P4Rcom
B + recycled rubber-plastic blends 184 16 – H
PG 76–22 – – – 7622

3
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al.
operated with a frequency changing from 100 rad/s to 0.1 rad/s at
three fixed temperatures, 30 °C, 45 °C, and 60 °C. The temperature
sweep test was conducted from 30 °C to 70 °C at a fixed frequency
of 10 rad/s.
2.3.2. Compatibility characterization
Cigar tube tests were employed to estimate the phase separa-
tion of the different rubber-plastic binder blends based on the rhe-
ological parameters such as complex modulus, phase angle, and
the viscosity [31]. An aluminum cigar tube, filled with the binder
blends, was sealed and placed in the oven vertically at a tempera-
ture of 170 °C for 24 h. After the conditioning, the heated tubes
were moved from the oven in a freezer instantaneously until they
were frozen. The tubes were cut into three sections afterward and
the binder blends from the top and bottom sections were extracted
for further testing. Based on the rheological parameters (jG j, d)
obtained from the DSR test, the separation index was determined
using the following equation:
ðjG j=sindÞmax ðjG j=sindÞav e
Separationindex ¼  100 ð1Þ
ðjG j=sindÞav e
where ðjG j=sindÞmax = the higher value of either top or bottom sec-
tions and ðjG j=sindÞav e = the average value of both the top and bot-
tom sections.
2.3.3. Optical microscopy test
The difference of microstructures between the top and bottom
sections of the modified binder blends collected after the cigar tube
test was identified using the optical microscopy test. The binder
binders after each modification approaches were also character-
ized through the optical microscopy test to explore the mechanism
of the modification. Around 5 mg of binder blends were heated and
spread evenly between the two slides. The specimens were viewed
under the microscope at a magnification of 100 times.
3. Results and analysis
3.1. Rheological characterization of binder blends
3.1.1. Frequency sweep test results
The frequency sweep test was first conducted for the different
modified binder blends through dynamic shear rheometer at
30 °C, 45 °C, and 60 °C. Based on the superposition principle, the
master curve was constructed at the reference temperature of
45 °C in a log scale [32,33]. The master curves of base binder (PG
64-22) and the SBS modified PG 76-22 were also plotted for rheo-
logical properties comparison.
Fig. 3(a) shows the master curves for binder blends modified by
plastic and different rubber contents. Compared with the base bin-
der, it is observed that the value of complex shear modulus rises
with the incorporation the rubber and plastic. The binder blends
with 4% and 8% rubber show a similar complex modulus, while
the addition of 12% rubber could significantly improve the complex
modulus, especially in a low reduced frequency. All the modified
rubber and plastic binder blends were stiffer than the SBS modified
asphalt, indicated by a higher complex shear modulus value.
Fig. 3(b) presents the master curves of binder blends modified
by various processed rubber and plastic. Compared with the
asphalt binder modified by plastic, the addition of 4% rubber pre-
sents a similar pattern but a slightly lower complex modulus value,
especially at lower frequencies. The utilization of compatibilizer
could further decrease the value of complex shear modulus. How-
ever, the recycled rubber-plastic blends reduced the complex shear
modulus significantly in which the curve is close to the SBS mod-
ified asphalt. Therefore, the different processed rubber and plastic
4
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could contribute to a notable difference in the rheological proper-
ties of the binder blends.
Phase angle is another parameter to evaluate the viscoelastic
properties of the asphalt in which a larger phase angle represents
a higher viscous portion of the binder blends [34]. Fig. 4(a) and
(b) plot the phase angle master curves of the asphalt binder blend
modified by different rubber contents and various rubber and plas-
tic wastes, respectively. The x-axis stands for the reduced fre-
quency in log scale while the y-axis is the phase angle. As
displayed in Fig. 4, the phase angle decreases with the increase
of the reduced frequency. Compared to the base binder, the incor-
poration of plastic and rubber could increase the elastic portion of
the binder blends, indicated by a lower phase angle. Besides, the
addition of 12% rubber has the lowest phase angle, reflecting that
the high content of rubber is capable of stiffening the binder blends
effectively.
As for the influence of various processed rubber and plastic on
the phase angle, the plastic modified asphalt presents the lowest
phase angle. Adding a small percentage of rubber and compatibi-
lizer could slightly increase the phase angle at all frequency stages.
However, the recycled rubber-plastic blends show a remarkable
increase in phase angle, in which it exceeds the SBS modified
asphalt, indicating that the viscous portion of the binder blends
was significantly improved. The phase angle master curve results
agree with the master curve results of complex shear modulus.
3.1.2. Temperature sweep test results
The temperature sweep test was operated at the frequency of
10 rad/s with a varied test temperature from 30 °C to 70 °C. The
rutting parameter jG j/sin d, reflecting the combined impact of
jG j and d, is used to characterize the rutting resistance of the mod-
ified binder blends. Fig. 5(a) shows the rutting parameter for bin-
der blends modified by plastic and different rubber content. As
the temperature increased, jG j/sin d decreased for all the binder
blends, indicating that the binder blends tended to be more viscous
and susceptible to rutting. Similar to the results of master curves,
the binder modified with plastic and rubber could improve the rut-
ting resistance of the binder blends. A large proportion of rubber
contents could also have a remarkable effect in improving the rut-
ting resistance of the binder blends. Fig. 5(b) illustrates the jG j/sin
d for asphalt binder blends modified with various processed rubber
and plastic. Compared to the asphalt binder modified with plastic,
the binder blends with the addition of rubber performed less rut-
ting resistance. The incorporation of compatibilizer slightly
reduced the rutting resistance of rubber-plastic modified asphalt.,
the recycled rubber-plastic blends showed a similar rutting resis-
tance as the SBS modified asphalt and satisfied the minimum
requirements for the rutting parameter of unaged binders (jG j/
sin d  1 kPa) at the high temperature according to AASHTO T315.
From the rheological characterization of the binder blends, it
can be summarized that both waste rubber and plastic could
increase the modulus and improve the rutting resistance of the
binder blends. Increasing the proportion of rubbers would have a
remarkable improvement in the rutting resistance. Furthermore,
the binder blends modified with different combination types of
rubber and plastic wastes such as the incorporation of compatibi-
lizer, especially the recycled rubber-plastic blends performed a sig-
nificant change of the rheological properties, which may due to the
improved compatibility and dispersion between the rubber-plastic
and asphalt. The cigar tube test and optical microscopy test were
further conducted to identify the compatibility of the rubber-
plastic modified asphalt in the next section.
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al.
Fig. 3. Complex shear modulus master curves for modified binder blends; (a) binder blends modified by plastic and different rubber contents; (b) binder blends modified
with various processed rubber and plastic.
3.2. Compatibility characterization of binder blends
Cigar tube tests were conducted to characterize the compatibil-
ity of the binder blends modified by waste rubber and plastics. The
asphalt from the top and bottom position of the tube after condi-
tioning were used for DSR tests. The complex shear modulus
(jG j) and phase angle (d) values of the modified binder blends at
60 °C are shown in Table 3. The separation index of different binder
blends is presented in Fig. 6.
As shown in Fig. 6 and Table 3, there existed a little separation
of the base binder due to some heavy residues during production.
When plastic was used to modify the asphalt, the plastic particles
were almost completely separated from the base binder and
5
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floated to the top section, reflected by a significant difference of
the jG jand d values between the top and bottom sections, since
the density of the plastic is smaller than that of the base asphalt
binder. The incorporation of rubber particles would cause more
interaction among rubber, plastic, asphalt, reflected by a reduction
of the separation index. With the addition of compatibilizer, the
jG j and d differences between the two sections decreased further
because compatibilizer could reduce the surface tension and
improve the interaction between the rubber and plastic particles
[35]. As for the asphalt modified by the recycled rubber-plastic
blends, the jG j values of the top and bottom sections of the binder
blends are 8.89  103 Pa and 1.22  104 Pa, respectively, which are
greater than that of the base binder, while the separation index is
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al.
Fig. 4. Phase angle master curves for modified binder blends. (a) binder blends modified by plastic and different rubber contents; (b) binder blends modified with various
processed rubber and plastic.
reducing to 17%. Therefore, pre-combining the rubber and plastic
in advance facilitated the interaction and dispersion of the
rubber-plastic into the asphalt, which showed a remarkable
improvement of the binder compatibility, homogeneity, and the
rutting resistance. As expected, the SBS modified asphalt per-
formed the best compatibility between the polymer and the
asphalt with a separation index of only 2%. The asphalt binder
blends modified by the pre-combined rubber and plastic have
the potential to improve the binder properties that are close to
SBS modified asphalt. The microstructures of the binder blends will
be characterized and analyzed in the next section.
3.3. Optical microscopy test results
3.3.1. The microstructures of the binder blends
The effects of the rubber-plastic binder blends modified by dif-
ferent processed rubber and plastic were visualized using an opti-
cal microscopy test. Fig. 7 shows the microstructure of blender
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blends at the magnification of 100. The yellow particles stand
for the plastic while the black particles represent the rubber. As
for the plastic modified asphalt, which is shown in Fig. 7(a), most
of the plastic particles coalesced together instead of evenly dis-
persed in the asphalt, indicating the incompatibility between the
asphalt and plastic particles. As shown in Fig. 7(b)–(d), the addition
of rubber into the binder blends allows the rubber particles to
detach the plastic particles into smaller sizes, however, there
remain some dissociative rubber particles due to the uncomplete
degradation. Compared with the asphalt modified with 4% rubber
and 4% plastic, the use of compatibilizer would have an explicit
effect, as presented in Fig. 7(e). It is confirmed that the compatibi-
lizer has the function of grafting the rubber and plastic particles
and facilitating the dispersion of the plastics in the asphalt. Fig. 7
(f) displays the asphalt modified by recycled rubber-plastic blends.
Due to the process of pre-commingling at a high temperature, the
melted rubber could stabilize the plastic efficiently, which allows
better diffusion of the rubbers and the separation of the plastic par-
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 5. jG j/sin d for modified binder blends. (a) binder blends modified by plastic and different rubber contents; (b) binder blends modified with various processed rubber and
plastic.

ticles into tiny sizes. It is necessary to point out that the large par- size and improve the dispersion of the rubber-plastic particles into
ticle with grey color in Fig. 7(f) is the polypropylene (PP) attached the asphalt.
by carbon in the rubber particles because PP is easier to be assem-
bled and attached by the carbon of rubber [25]. There existed little
3.3.2. The microstructures of the asphalt from cigar tube tests.
rubber particles in the binder blends since most of the degraded
Fig. 8 illustrated the microstructure of binder blends from cigar
rubber particles would diffuse into the asphalt during the mixing.
tube tests, which is used to visualize and verify the compatibility of
Hence, pre-combining rubber and plastic before asphalt modifica-
the binder blends influenced by the different processed methods of
tion was the most effective way to minimize the plastic particle
rubber and plastic. Fig. 8(a) and (b) display the top and bottom lay-
ers of the plastic modified asphalt, respectively. It is noticed that
Table 3 the plastic remained a whole part in the top section, while there
jG j/sin(d) results of the modified binders from the cigar tube test.
are almost no plastic particles in the bottom section, indicating
4P 4P4R 4P4Rcom 4P8R that the compatibility was very poor between the plastic and
Top 5.2E+06 4.92E+06 3.80E+05 9.21E+05 asphalt. When the 4% rubber was added into the asphalt, as shown
Bottom 6.3E+03 1.52E+04 2.56E+04 1.96E+04 in Fig. 8(c) and (d), some rubber particles attached to the plastic
4P12R H 7622 6422 particles in the top section and the plastic started to separate.
Top 4.26E+05 3.80E+05 9.63E+03 2.26E+03
Few separated plastic particles remained in the bottom section
Bottom 2.84E+04 2.56E+04 1.01E+04 2.90E+03
with the help of rubbers. According to Fig. 8(e) and (f), with the
7
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 6. The separation index for asphalt binder blends.

Fig. 7. Microstructures of binder blends: (a) 4P; (b) 4P4R; (c) 4P8R; (d) 4P12R; (e) 4P4Rcom; (f) H.

assist of compatibilizer, more rubber particles diffused into the
asphalt, reflected by the darker color of the asphalt binder than
the one without compatibilizer. No significant phase changes of
the plastic were detected compared with the binder blends with-
out compatibilizers in the top section; however, in the bottom
section, the plastic particles were characterized by smaller sizes
and dispersed more homogeneously in the asphalt, which means
that the compatibility of the modified binder blends was improved.
As for the asphalt modified by the recycled rubber-plastic blends,
which is shown in Fig. 8(g) and (h), rubber was capable of cutting
the plastic particle into tiny sizes and dispersing homogenously in
the asphalt in the top section, while more small plastic particles
and fewer rubber particles were found in the bottom section since
the rubber particles were absorbed by asphalt and interacted with
the plastic particles, which indicated a notable improvement of the
binder compatibility.

8
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 8. Microstructures of binder blends from cigar tube test: (a) 4P_top; (b) 4P_bottom; (c) 4P4R_top; (d) 4P4R_bottom; (e) 4P4Rcom_top; (f) 4P4Rcom_bottom; (g) H_top;
(h) H_bottom.

9
Y. Ma, S. Wang, H. Zhou et al.
4. Discussion of the results
In summary, asphalt modified with various rubber and plastic
wastes could have remarkable differences in compatibility and
rheological properties of the binder blends. To be specific, waste
plastic enhances the rutting resistance of the asphalt; however, a
severe phase separation appears when mixed with asphalt. Waste
rubbers could assist the dispersion of the plastic particles into
smaller sizes and improve the compatibility of the binder blends
with limited potential. With the help of compatibilizer, the interac-
tion between the rubber and plastic is further improved, resulting
in smaller plastic particle sizes and better compatibility of the bin-
der blends. Based on the cigar tube test, nevertheless, there still
exist severe phase separations between the rubber and plastic,
indicating that the modifiers are not adequate for field utilization.
The asphalt modified by recycled rubber-plastic blends shows a
significant improvement in the compatibility of the binder blends.
A completely different morphology from other modifiers is identi-
fied thorough the optical microscopy, in which micrometer plastic
particles combined with irregularly shaped rubbers disperse in the
brown asphalt phase, indicating a good interfacial adhesion
between the rubber and plastic. This remarkable enhancement of
the stability of the blends was further demonstrated through the
cigar tube test and the subsequent microscopy test.
Previous studies investigated the stabilization mechanism of
the rubber and plastic modified asphalt. When plastic and rubber
were mixed in the asphalt, plastic will be swollen by absorption
of the nonpolar components with low molecule weight, while rub-
ber mainly interacts with the aromatic fraction components [36].
The stability of rubber and plastic could be characterized in terms
of thermodynamic, kinetic, and steric effects. The thermodynamic
effect can be facilitated with the use of compatibilizer to increase
the adhesion between the asphalt and polymer. The kinetic effect
could be improved by reducing the polymer sizes and increasing
the asphalt viscosity. The steric effect reflects the coalescence
between asphalt and plastic [25]. The production of the rubber-
plastic hose could minimize the size of the rubber and plastic
and mingle them together to form a stabilized product. Further-
more, covered with the finely dispersed rubber, the plastic parti-
cles are prevented to coalesce together in the asphalt, which
improves the compatibility of the binder blends regarding the ther-
modynamic, kinetic, and steric effects. Therefore, this type of
rubber-plastic alloyed wastes is capable of asphalt modification
with good compatibility and rheological properties. Moreover, it
seems feasible to pretreat the independent plastic waste and rub-
ber waste using a similar procedure to achieve the target compat-
ibility. By adjusting the rubber and plastic contents, the binder
blends are expected to perform similar modification effects as
the SBS modified asphalt, providing an opportunity to recycle a
large amount of waste rubber and plastic in asphalt pavements.
As a matter of fact, some limitations exist in this study includ-
ing a fixed content of the recycled rubber-plastic blends and a
specific ratio of the rubber and plastic in the blends. Further
studies should be focused on the manufacturing of different con-
tents and the combination of the rubber-plastic blends for asphalt
modification. The comparison between the rubber-plastic asphalt
and SBS upon various aging conditions are still worth more
investigations.
5. Conclusions
The compatibility and rheological properties of the asphalt
modified by multiple combinations of the rubber and plastic were
investigated in this study by using DSR tests, cigar tube test, and
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optical microscopy tests. Based on the test results, the conclusions
can be summarized as follows:
1. Adding plastic and rubber could improve the complex modulus
and rutting resistance of the binder blends; however, there
existed a significant separation between the plastic and asphalt,
which limited the application in the field.
2. The addition of rubber had limited capability in dispersing the
plastic particles into smaller sizes and preventing the coales-
cence of plastic particles in the asphalt, while more rubber con-
tents could improve the rutting resistance of the binder blends
but had limited capability for the binder compatibility.
3. The use of compatibilizer was able to facilitate the interaction
and dispersion of rubber and plastic particles into the asphalt,
which improved the compatibility of the binder blends. How-
ever, the phase separation of blends still remained, which hin-
dered the independent use of rubber and plastic wastes.
4. Using the pre-combined recycled rubber-plastic blends demon-
strated a remarkable improvement in the compatibility and sta-
bility of the modified binder blends.
5. Rubber and plastic wastes had the potential to be utilized for
asphalt modification through some special pre-processed
approaches, which was capable of achieving the binder proper-
ties close to the commercialized SBS modified asphalt.
Author contributions
The authors confirm contribution to the paper as follows: study
conception and design: Baoshan Huang, Shifeng Wang, Yuetan Ma;
data collection: Yuetan Ma, Pawel Polaczyk; analysis and interpre-
tation of results: Yuetan Ma, Miaomiao Zhang; draft manuscript
preparation: Yuetan Ma, Hongyu Zhou, Wei Hu. All authors
reviewed the results and approved the final version of the
manuscript.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
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