Mechanical behaviour of UGM for portuguese conditions

Coarse aggregate is widely used in the unbound granular layers (UGM) of roads, in particular as granular sub-base and base. However, although various studies have been conducted on these materials, their mechanical behaviour has not been yet properly characterized, in Portuguese conditions. This has special importance for Portuguese pavement technology. In the attempt of contributing for a better knowledge of that behaviour, an experimental work was undertaken to access the structural performance and to establish behaviour models for crushed materials coming from different lithologies, namely limestone and granite, susceptible of being used as UGM. This paper describes the principal results obtained from this work pointing out the main directions that can be extracted from it, in terms of the global behaviour of a road pavement