Hot Rolled Asphalt (HRA)

surface course mixtures

All the HRA mixtures are specified

in BS EN13108-4.

All laying thicknesses, tolerances etc are

specified in BS594987.

There are two types

of HRA surface course,

chipped and unchipped**
**( also known as 55/10,

55/14, high stone content

HRA and medium temperature HRA).

Un-chipped

and

chipped HRAs

Chipped HRA is a mat of sand/filler/binder,

bulked out with 14mm crushed rock aggregate,

onto which high psv crushed rock chipppings,
pre-coated with 50 pen bitumen, are spread and
rolled into the mat.
We speak of 30/14 HRA and 35/14 HRA.

These contain 30% and 35% of 14mm aggregate

The bitumen is grade 40/60pen.

HRA surface course, binder and aggregates,

(chippings not shown)

Old photo of crew laying chipped HRA

A typical chipped HRA site, texture depth 1.2 mm

Another typical chipped HRA site, texture depth 1.5mm

A typical 55/10 HRA site, TD about 1mm

The 55/10 and 55/14 have 55% of 10mm stone

and 14mm stone respectively, but all high psv.
Both are usually made with 100/150pen** grade
bitumen.
Both never deform by wheel-tracking and they
are also first class patching materials

(**If you use grade 40/60pen, it is extremely

difficult to hand lay)

30/14 surface course, no chippings shown, it is about

98% impermeable. NB NO aggregate interlock

Note the aggregate interlock. This is Close graded AC

surface course, cheaper than HRA, but not as durable. Not
impermeable. OK for some sites.

BSEN 13108-4 specifies 2 fine aggregate types,

Type F and Type C
Type F uses either natural fines OR
a blend of natural fines and crushed rock fines
Type C uses only crushed rock fines.

Typical natural sand as

seen through a microscope

Crushed rock fines to the same magnification

In my experience, Type C HRA, using only

crushed rock fines, is totally resistant to
deformation but extremely difficult to lay and
compact.
Some years ago, on the M5, an HRA
surface course made with crushed rock fines
failed within 5 years because of its poor
compaction

Most of HRA surface course is sand. HRA made with wet

sand can cause serious loss of level tolerances when paving
( It should be stored under cover to keep it dry)

COLD 20mm chippings of high psv

aggregate, pre-coated with bitumen, are

scattered onto, then rolled-into the HOT

mat using a high degree of skill to avoid
them being pushed too deeply into the mat.
Note that these are the only high psv aggregates used in
chipped HRA , a very sustainable use of a scarce
resource

Some images of work before paving and chipping

machines in the 1920s ( from Tarmacs archives)

Hand laying HRA, in the 1940s (from Tarmacs archives)

Paving machines were invented in the USA

in 1930 and were brought to the UK in
about 1942 for building US Army Airforce

bomber bases for in East Anglia.

They were first used on civilian sites after
WW2

Hand-chipping before the chipping machine and

the Health and Safety Act !!

One idea was to modify a paver to apply pre-coated

chippings to HRA

But the chipping machine, designed by TRRL,

eliminated hand chipping

Prior to 1978, all HRAs were recipe mixes,

ie so much sand,
so much filler,
so much bitumen,
plus 30% by mass of 14mm single size
crushed rock
However, following very severe deformation
of surface courses in the UK 1976 and 1977,
HA then moved to design mixes, involving
the Marshall test method

Producers used the Marshall test to achieve

target Marshall stabilities (stiffnesss)

and limits of flow (deformation of the test
sample)

Also, to optimise the binder content for use in

achieving these stabilities with the sand the mix
producer planned to use.

The Marshall test machine

Mix design, with acknowledgements to the late

Colin Loveday

How changes of binder and filler affect deformation

The first uses of design mixes

eliminated many previously widely used
sands as unsuitable
(ie mixes made with them deformed too easily)

Subsequently, the HRAs made using the

Marshall design method, eliminated wheel
tracking problems for many years, until the
early 1990s

Digressing slightly.....
In 1984, some county council Agent

Authorities used designed HRAs made

with modified bitumens on jobs laid in winter,
to get better workability in cold weather.
The trick was to forget 50pen bitumen, instead

use 70pen, which deforms more easily ...BUT..

To stop the 70pen mix deforming in

hot summers, the binder was blended with either

SBS or EVA before being added to the mixer.

This increased the cost of the HRA
BUT ONLY MARGINALLY.

One site was the M6, Junctions 10A to 11.

This included Hilton Park Service Area,

so works were not allowed to start until
October 31.

The contract period was 5 months so work

continued all winter.

HRA surface course work in February 1985

Trying to melt the snow with an infra-red heater!

The modified 70 pen HRA

lasted 21 years on one of the most heavily
trafficked lengths of motorway in the UK with

more than 100,000 vpd and 30% hgvs

There was absolutely NO wheel-tracking
deformation

End of digression..............
In the early 1990s some HRAs started to

deform on SOME, not all, parts of the most

heavily trafficked sections of some
motorways and trunk roads.

The first uses of design mixes

eliminated many previously widely used
sands as unsuitable
(ie mixes made with them deformed too easily)

Subsequently, the HRAs made using the

Marshall design method, eliminated wheel
tracking problems for many years, until the
early 1990s

HRA on the M6, as seen in 1993, deformed by very

heavy traffic

A typical 1980s UK HGV artic and trailer

Stress in pavement, one end of an axle with two

tyres, 5.5 tonne load, from the old type of UK
artic tractor and trailer

The French had similar deformation problems

with their asphalt concretes, (dense macadams

with optimised bitumen contents)

They had invented the three axle artic trailer,
the super-single tyre and have a 13 tonne axle load,

a triple whammy

Triple-axle artic and trailer, with super single high

pressure tyres, increasingly seen in the UK in the 1990s
and ever since !!

Super single tyre, same load as on the twin tryes

French test specimens, failed!

The French solution:-

Use very stiff binder courses, 15pen EME2

+
very thin mixtures with modified bitumens
These were too thin to deform more than 5mm
(eg Safepave, UL-M)
These were introduced into UK
by small surfacing companies in 1991/2

HAs solution, Clause 943,

PERFORMANCE SPECIFIED HRA,

made with modified bitumens

introduced in 1994.

HAs Clause 943 solution ,

10 years after the Agent Authorities had first

successfully used modified binders,
included testing cores removed from jobs
and testing them in the UK wheel-tracking
machine.

The UK wheel-tracking machine, now called the

small device

In 1994, if the cores deformed by more than 7mm at

60 C. or at a rate greater than 5mm/hr **
then the contractor had to plane out the HRA and
start again.
Contractors very sensibly priced this risk

and the rate /sq.m for HRA doubled overnight.

**NB The test method has been slightly modified on becoming a
BSEN test, but the BS 598(pt110) method and values are still the
current. The values are listed in Appendix C.3 of PD6691

Plot of a wheel track test, sample fails,

deformation greater than 7mm.

So, HA had solved the problem but could

not afford the solution!
Instead, they looked to see how the French
and Germans dealt with such problems.

This resulted in the introduction of the many

BBA/HAPAS materials we have seen since
(and record breaking numbers of potholes.)

So now we had

( and still have)......

recipe chipped HRA

designed chipped HRA

and performance specified chipped HRA
But in BSEN 13108-4 for HRA, design mixes
are specified to also meet wheel-tracking test
criteria.
Virtually all recipe mixes have disappeared

Map of UK showing ALL flexible roads NOT surfaced with

HRA in 1993 ( no other map shown)

A myth has grown up about the deformation of

chipped HRA.
Next is an example of a deformed HRA at a bus
stop.
It also could deform at traffic signals
BUT NOT ALL HRAs DEFORMED AT

BUS STOPS AND TRAFFIC SIGNALS

Aberdeen, HRA deformed at a bus stop,

elsewhere along the road it is 100% OK

A length of unchipped, 55/10 HRA ,

laid at bus stops

in place of the chipped HRA would solve

this deformation problem.

From the contractors viewpoint,

even normal, unmodified, chipped HRA is a

high risk material, since if chippings are
lost in the first 2 or 3 weeks,
this is usually entirely his fault.

Chipping loss due to end of load being too cool.

Chipping loss is exacerbated if the crew

were working in weather which was

very cold or windy
or

they were working in heavy rain

Chipped in heavy rain to meet political deadline

( which was not in the contract!!)

Another cause of chipping loss.....

If the chippings were frosty,
because they had been stockpiled on site in

winter but not covered with sheets to keep

them free of frost.

Problem due chipping machine not working

properly and dropping the chippings in rows.

Another cause of chipping loss.....

If they were dusty,

or had been stored too long in sunlight
which tended to harden the bitumen on the
chippings
so it was no longer a good adhesive when
they were rolled into the mat.

Oxidised chippings

HRA was marginally too cool when it was laid

and chipped

The contractor usually needed at least 11 men

to lay chipped HRA
whereas with SMAs etc he only needed 7 men,

the same as for 55/10 and 55/14.

The SMAs and thin AC mixes were both cheaper
and quieter
so many LAs started to specify them instead of
chipped HRA, and the rest, as they say, is history.

A crew laying chipped HRA, 8 here plus loading

shovel driver, a very slim crew! Normally 11

Before starting paving try to get 60 tonnes in

front of the paver and make sure all the prep
work is completed,
ie ironwork adjusted to new levels
vertical faces of kerbs and ironwork all painted
with hot bitumen

any regulating course or planing completed

surface to be overlaid swept clean and properly
tack-coated

Dont let the truck bump into the paver!

Truck protects asphalt in paver

Chippings being spread onto the just laid

HRA mat

To be successful,
the cold chippings, which are rolled into the mat,
need to absorb sufficient heat from the asphalt
mat for their bitumen coating to melt.
They then glue themselves into the hot mat.

( If they suddenly Glisten as the bitumen

coating melts, youll have no problems)

The cool end of load, the cause of so many of our

problems, even today with smas etc.

The same mat showing new hot mix

How Tarmac used to reduce cool ends of loads and

subsequent chipping loss problems

JOINTS
New BS 594987 clause 6.8
..Joints in surface courses shall be cut

Note neatly cut edge to mat no 1, the cut should

be the thickness of mat from edge.

Applying bitumen to mat edge

Attention to joint (2)

Fortunately, chipping loss from HRA

can be
remedied by re-heating and re-rolling,
as long as it is done within a few days

of the chip loss.

Re-heating with infra-red heater

Re-heated mat

Adding new chippings, mat then rolled with Bomag 100

or similar

Good quality, well designed, chipped HRAs,

laid and compacted by competent crews,
should last for up to 30 years on typical
city centre sites and more than 20 years on
motorways.
This is because its void content is about 3%
to 4% so it is virtually impermeable to both
air and water.

HRA 22 years old, never bonded, but strong and

watertight.

Even 30 years old and failing, the lowest part of the

matrix still protects the underlying road pavement

35 year old HRA in central Milton Keynes, 2012.

18 years old and never a pothole!!

If you want an attractive, very durable

asphalt, look no further !

With such a long life, the chippings can

become polished whilst the HRA still has
years of life.
However, the surface can easily and cheaply
be re-textured using one of several
systems,

See HD 37/99

And finally, no asphalt type is easier to patch

successfully if some ****** digs it up!

Thank you for listening.