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Heat Transfer Model and Numerical Simulation for Microwave Hot In-Place Recycling of Asphalt Pavements Song-qing Zhu1, Jin-fei Shi1, , and Tong-sheng Sun1 edited by Thomas J. McGean2 1 College of Mechanical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China; email:zsqztclw@hotmail.com 2 Melfa, VA 23410, USA; email:tjmpe@verizon.net
Abstract: To assess the temperature field when microwave heating is used to recycle

asphalt mixtures, a two-dimensional mathematic model considering the heat absorbed and conducted by microwave internal heat-generation was developed based on a Fourier heat transfer model. The microwave internal heat-generation was modeled by approximating the radial field by a two dimensional planar surface with uniform dielectric properties throughout. The control volume based finite difference method (CV-BDM) was used to establish a discrete form of the energy conservation equations, and a numerical simulation was conducted. Results showed that non-linear heat transfer. For confirmation, an experiment was conducted using a microwave power system at 2.45GHz and recording the temperature variation as a function of surface location and heating time within samples of asphalt mixture. The data confirmed that this microwave heating method could both heat the mixture in a reasonable time and improve temperature uniformity.
Introduction

Asphalt has been widely used in constructing high-quality roads, bridges and airport pavements. However, due to heavy traffic loads and environmental factors, functional damage to the surface of asphalt pavements such as formation of cracks and potholes is inevitable over time. This requires prompt repair and maintenance. Microwave recycling, which has the advantages of deep penetration, small thermal inertia and ease of control (Zhu et al., 2006), has currently become an important hot in-place recycling (HIPR) technology, and has attracted more and more attention. Recent research on microwave recycling has included experiments on ways to repair asphalt pavements, the sensitivity of various parameters on the microwave recycling process, and measurement of the dielectric properties of asphalt mixtures. (Bosisio,etal.,1974;Al-Ohaly,et al.,1988;Shoenberger,et al.,1995). In addition, further research has identified several factors critical to the success of in-place microwave heating when used to repair pavement. These key factors include post-heating temperature distribution within the asphalt mixture and the effective control of heating temperature and heating depth. Hopstock(2003)and Zanko et al.(2004) from Minnesota performed the first theoretical analysis of microwave heating of asphalt mixtures. However, in their studies only one-dimensional heat transfer was taken into account. The microwave radiator in HIPR is of the horn type with a pyramidal

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shaped radiating cone. It was noted in the experiments that the uneven distribution of electrical field intensity on the surface of roads resulted in a corresponding uneven distribution of temperature on the asphalt mixture surface. This led to the formation of hot-spots and cold-spots on the asphalt surface. In other words, the temperature of the mixture in hot-spots has met the recycling criteria but in cold-spots the mixture has not completely melted, leading to decreased recycling efficacy and repair quality. Apparently, one-dimensional analysis has significant limitations. In our analysis we have considered two dimensional heat conduction using microwave as an intrinsic heat source which is a closer approximation to the actual conditions found in microwave heat recycling. Theoretically, the physical parameters of all materials may change as a function of temperature. Here we have ignored any temperature-induced changes in the physical parameters of asphalt mixtures in order to simplify the analysis. 1. Heat transfer model within microwave recycling The microwave radiating heater is positioned above the asphalt pavement as shown in Fig.1. D1D2is the surface size of the horn, h is the height of the horn above the pavement surface, and H is the thickness of the pavement. A coordinate system is established as shown in Fig.2 with the z-axis in the direction of microwave propagation and the x-y plane on the pavement surface. Microwave energy, emitted by a magnetron-tube antenna and focused by the horn cavity, heats the pavement thereby hot-recycling the asphalt. The assumptions used to construct the mathematic model are as follows:1)For propagation in the z-direction, the thickness of the recycling layer is small compared with the microwave attenuation depth within asphalt mixtures, so a uniform temperature distribution can be assumed;2)Radiation and convection heat exchange can be ignored;3)The microwave energy is completely absorbed by the asphalt mixture with no loss due to energy reflected off the pavement surface.;4)The horn surface is adiabatic; that is no heat is lost through the horn to the atmosphere. 1.1 .Governing equation of heat transfer According to the above assumptions, a two dimensional Fourier model with unsteady state temperature distribution within the asphalt-mixture was constructed. Thermal properties such as thermal conductivity and specific heat were assumed constant throughout the pavement. The energy equation within the asphalt mixture samples can be written as k eff [ T ( x, y, t ) 2 T ( x , y , t ) 2 T ( x, y , t ) + ] + ( x, y ) = C p t y 2 x 2 (1)

where T is the temperature(C), is the strength of the internal heat source( W / m 3 ) t is the time in seconds k eff and C p are the thermal conductivity( W / m / C ) the material density( kg / m 3 ) and the specific of asphalt mixtures ( J / kg / C ),

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respectively. As noted, all have been assumed to be constants in the current analysis. 1.2. Microwave internal heat-generation An asphalt mixture is a lossy medium for microwave energy and this energy dissipation generates internal heat which increases the pavement temperature. The sinusoidal time variation of the microwave field is negligible when compared with the temperature variations within the asphalt mixture, since the microwave frequencies are very high (2.45GHz). The root mean square (RMS) dissipation power in an arbitrarily small volume of asphalt mixture can be expressed as ~ ~ (2) Pi = 0.5561 10 6 f r' tan Ei2Vi = Kf r' tan Ei2Vi

where Pi is the dissipation power in ith mixture sample volume(W), f is the microwave frequency(Hz), r' is the relative dielectric permittivity(F/m), tan is the dielectric loss tangent, E i and Vi are the averaged value of instantaneous electric field amplitude (V/m) and volume( m3 )of the ith sample, respectively. As the ith sample is a micro-unit with dxdydz magnitudes, the strength of the intrinsic heat source can be written as ~
~

i ( x, y ) = Pi / Vi = Kf r' tan Ei2

(3)

In reality, when radiation heating is processed using a pyramidal horn antenna, the average distance between the opening of the horn and the surface of the asphalt pavement h<10(/2), and so can be considered as near field radiation. So the surface field can be approximately considered as radiation field, when h=0 the surface field is named radiation especially. A surface coordinate system can be established as shown in Fig.2, where the center of the surface is the coordinate origin, the electric field is in the x-axis, the magnetic field is in the y-axis and the propagation direction is in the z-axis. The center of the pyramidal horn surface is set as phase zero. The surface field can be expressed as
phasic center radiate horn cavity

Y X Z propagation direction asphalt samples

Fig. 1 Schematic of microwave heating recycling

Fig.2 Coordinate of pyramidal horn surface

x(i)2
R1 + y ( j )2 ) R2

j ( x(i ) ~ E i = E 0 cos( )e D1

(4)

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In the equation, R 1 is the horn length in the H-field, R 2 is the horn length in the E-field, and x(i ) and y ( j ) are x-direction and y-direction node positions respectively. 1.3. Initial and boundary conditions The initial condition of the asphalt samples can be specified as at (5) T = T ( x, y, t ) = T0 t =0 As a result of symmetry, shown as Fig.2, the thermal boundary conditions of the asphalt sample walls may be approximately assumed as

T = T T = T

at x = D1 / 2 ; T / x = 0

at x = 0 at y = 0

(6) (7)

at y = D2 / 2 ; T / y = 0

where T0 and T are the surroundings and initial temperatures respectively and T0 = T . 2. Numerical simulation 2.1. Numerical method and mesh generation In view of the symmetry of the four quadrants as shown in Fig.3, a mesh may be established using one-fourth of the pavement surface with the D1D2 dimensions taken as 150 120mm . A uniform mesh generation with x = y = 5mm requires 15 nodes in the x-direction and 12 nodes in the y-direction. Let i and j be the x and y labels for each node, and x(i ) and y ( j ) be the x and y coordinates for each node (see (4)) respectively. Heat flux within the control volume is assumed uniform. For the 2D model, taking the thickness of 1 in z-direction xy is the volume of the control volume. The control volume based finite difference method (CV-BDM) was used to establish the discrete scheme of the conservation equations. The discrete 2D equation is specified as a P P = a E E + aW W + a N N + a S S + b 2.2. The calculation results and discussions Original calculation parameters used were as follows: An AC-13I asphalt sample was selected with asphalt aggregate ratio of 5.3%, = 2435kg / m 3 ,
C p = 0.8896J / g / C , eff = 1.560W / m / C .Other parameters were T0 = T = 18C ,

(8)

r' = 5.8 and tan = 0.0344 . A 2M210F magnetron-tube with a working frequency
of 2.455GHz and effective output power of 650W was used. Therefore
E 0 = 480P ' /( D1 D 2 ) = 7.38 10 3 Vm 1 ( Gu, &Shen ,1980). The temperature distribution fields within the sample are shown in Fig.4 after heating for 600 seconds and 900 seconds. .The highest temperature is at the coordinate origin, namely the samples center. The temperature gradient along the

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x-direction is smaller than in the y-direction and the temperature is lower at the edge of the sample, so the heat loss rate must be decreased in order to improve the uniformity of temperature distribution. The increase of temperature is obviously nonlinear; it rises slowly from 18C to 86.2C in the first 10 minutes but then it increases rapidly to143.4C within the next five minutes. In other words the higher the temperature, the faster the rate at which the temperature increases. Therefore, the heating time must be carefully monitored to avoid pitch coking. 3. Experiment system of microwave recycling 3.1. Experimental device The experimental device is shown in Fig.5. For the safety of operators during the experiment, a metal web hood was made to shield the radiation. A grid template was made for measuring the temperature of the sample. The surface of the sample was divided into an 8 10 grid.
(x ) w (x ) e

D2 / 2

x( i )

m a g n etro n -tu b e p ro m p tin g c av ity

(y ) n y( j ) (y ) s

p y ra m id a l h o rn ra d ia tio n c a v ity

a s p h a lt m ix tu re s a m p le

D1 / 2

Fig.3 Mesh grid for 2D CV-BDM

Fig.5 Microwave heating experiment device

(a)

(a)

(b) (b) Fig.4 Simulation temperature distributions within the samples: (a) t=600s; (b) t=900s Fig.6 Experimental temperature distributions within samples: (a) continuous heating; (b) intermittently heating

3.2. Results and discussion The temperature was obtained using an infrared thermometer while heating the

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sample continuously for 15 minutes and also while intermittently heating the sample by heating for five minutes at one minute intervals, and the recorded temperature fields were plotted as shown as Fig.6. The results indicate that the highest temperature is near the center of the surface. The highest temperature was about 15 lower than the numerical simulation due to reflection of energy off the pavement surface and energy lost from the horn surface to the atmosphere. The results show that heating intermittently produces a more uniform temperature distribution than heating continuously. In addition, the temperature distribution agrees reasonably well with the numerical simulation. Therefore, it is expected that use of this analytical model can help to improve HIPR technology. 4. Conclusions Based on the Fourier equations for heat transfer, a two-dimensional heat transfer model was built and microwave internal heat-generation was studied according to the law of near-field radiation. The results, in good agreement with the numerical simulation, indicate that pavement quality can be improved by ameliorating heating techniques. These methods provide a practical guide for microwave hot-in place recycling of asphalt pavements. References Al-Ohaly A. A., and Terrel R. L. (1988). Effect of microwave heating on adhesion and moisture damage of asphalt mixtures. Transportation Research Record, 1171, 27-36. Bosisio R. G., Spooner J., and Granger J. (1974). Asphalt road maintenance with a mobile microwave power unit. J. Microwave Power, 9 (4) 381-386. Hopstock D. M. (2003). Microwave-absorbing road construction and repair material Final Report to NRRI on Idea Evaluation Subcontract , Minnesota. Ruilong Gu, Minyi Shen.(1980). Microwave technology and antenna. Defense Industry Press, Beijing. (in Chinese) Shoenberger J.E., Rollings R.S., and Graham R. T. (1995). Properties of microwave recycled asphalt cement binders. Proceedings of the Conference on Physical Properties of Asphalt Cement Binders. Dallas, TX, ASTM Special Technical Publication, 1241,199-213. Zanko L. M., and Hopstock D. M. (2004). Minnesota taconite as a microwave-absorbing road aggregate material for deicing and pothole patching Applications. Minnesota Department of Transportation Research Services Section, 3, 1-16. Zhu Songqing, Shi Junfei, and Wang Hongxiang (2006). Modeling and experiment of microwave heating for hot in-place recycling of asphalt pavements. J. Southeast University (Natural Science Edition), 36(3), 393-396 (in Chinese)

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