If you own a professional building, your parking lot should always be in good repair so your customers feel at ease when they pull onto your property. A parking lot that's faded and falling apart makes it look like you're neglectful or sloppy. That doesn't do your business any favors.
By having asphalt services when they're needed, your parking lot can stay in good shape for many years. Two basic services that keep your lot from deteriorating too fast are repairing cracks and having a sealcoat put on. Here's why these asphalt services are important and how they're done.
Repairing Cracks In Asphalt
It's normal when asphalt starts to break down. When the asphalt ages and is exposed to the sun, the binder dries out, and that allows cracks to form. Plus, cracks might develop due to the weight of all the traffic on your lot or when rain enters a crack, freezes, expands, and makes a small crack worse. These early cracks need to be filled in before they get bigger.
Damage to asphalt continues to escalate until repairs are done. Cracks can turn into potholes. Water can seep into cracks and holes that damage the base under the asphalt and lead to more severe damage, such as alligator cracks, and the need to repair the base. These more severe problems can be prevented by filling cracks when they're still small.
An asphalt service can do this with hot tar or a crack filler compound and equipment that fills and covers cracks. The filler is compacted and leveled so the parking lot still has a flat surface. If only a few cracks are found, these might be filled in by hand instead. In either case, the area with cracks has to be cleaned first so the filler adheres well.
Sealcoating The Asphalt
Sealcoating is another important asphalt service that helps your parking lot last longer. When your lot has a coating on it, rain can't seep into the asphalt. The coating also protects the asphalt from the sun, so UV damage slows down. A sealcoat protects your parking lot, so it has a longer life, but the sealcoat wears off in the process. This is normal.
To keep protection ongoing, you'll need the sealcoat applied every few years. Before sealcoating is done, the entire parking lot has to be cleaned. Cracks and other damage have to be repaired if present. Sealcoating is applied to the entire lot and not just the area that had damage. This gives your parking lot a uniform dark color so the dark color of the crack filler isn't as obvious.
Reach out to local companies that offer asphalt services to learn more.
Share13 July 2023
Paving contractors spend all day laying the pavement. We figured that the least we could do was write about it! In other words, we plan on laying the pavement of information. Yes, that sounds a little cheesy, but sometimes it's okay to sound cheesy when talking about something as serious as pavement. We caught your attention, didn't we? Now that we've caught your attention, allow us to share a little more about this blog. It will feature articles about paving and pavement contractors, and we plan on providing a lot of different information and perspectives as we go. You're welcome to join us!