PREPARATIVE SIZE-EXCLUSION CHROMATOGRAPHY SEPARATION OF SHRP ASPHALTS: CORRELATION WITH YISCOELASTIC PROPERTIES

ABSTRACT

Eight core asphalts and eleven other asphalts selected for study in the Strategic Highway Research Program have been separated into two or more fractions by means of preparative size-exclusion chromatography. The first fraction obtained by this technique is believed to consist of materials that form associations and correspond roughly to asphalt dispersed phases. This phase is polar, aromatic, and of high apparent molecular weight. Subsequent fractions obtained by size exclusion chromatography of the asphalts are of progressively lower molecular weight. When the asphalts were separated into nine fractions, the weights of each fraction were plotted versus elution volume to give distinctive bimodal chromatograms, with one exception.

The first eluted size exclusion fractions consist of the major viscosity-building components of the asphalts. When these fractions are removed from asphalts, the weight fractions of the residual materials correlate with tan δ (ratio of viscous to elastic moduli)s of the whole asphalts at 26° (77°F). Gel-type asphalts have low values of tan δ and large amounts of material in their initially eluted size-exclusion chromatography fractions. For sol-type asphalts, the reverse is true. For the nineteen asphalts studied size-exclusion chromatography fractionation patterns, which are a fundamental chemical property, correlate with the aforementioned fundamental physical property