Rheological Properties and Application of Molasses Modified Bitumen in Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA)

The high volume of water in molasses has made this study serious. The reason is that using molasses as a partial replacement without treatment significantly affects the rheological properties of the neat bitumen and increases the likelihood of moisture susceptibility of the hot-mix asphalt (HMA) pavement structure and create fractures of aggregate particles. Therefore, to use molasses as a partial replacement without affecting the structural integrity of the pavement, this study proposed a treatment method before blending it with bitumen. The main objective of this study is to investigate the effect and the potential of using molasses as a modifier for neat bitumen using chemical and rheological approach. The control binder was a performance grade (PG58-10) petroleum-based neat asphalt binder. A series of experiment was conducted to accomplish the objective of this paper, including convectional tests, Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) test, amplitude and frequency sweep test, performa