Asphalt paving is an ideal choice for virtually any type of pavement in North Georgia. Asphalt pavements are attractive, safe, economical, and easy to maintain. However, the asphalt paving company that installed your pavement likely informed you that the key to a long, economical life for an asphalt pavement is proper maintenance. Your contractor may have discussed several tips to help you protect your pavement, including the need to keep the pavement clean, avoid stationary heavy loads, and repair any cracks as quickly as possible. More than likely, your contractor also emphasized the need to have a professional sealcoat your pavement before its first anniversary, followed by fresh applications every two or three years. Professional asphalt sealing can often double a pavement’s life, but it can also dramatically reduce the number and cost of any repairs that might be needed. However, one issue that a sealcoating contractor can overlook is the use of additives in a sealant mix.
Why Would a Maintenance Contractor Use Sealant Additives?
Sealant additives are designed to enhance specific properties or benefits of sealcoats. For example, sealants cure relatively quickly, but a parking lot maintenance contractor might use an additive so that the lot can be sealed, striped, and reopened in less time. If a customer needs a contractor to sealcoat his pavement late in the season, an additive might allow the contractor to perform the task during borderline weather conditions. Customers whose pavements receive an extremely high volume of traffic might want to increase the durability of the sealant, and there is an additive that can be used for that purpose. By itself, sealcoating can typically restore faded asphalt pavements to their original black color, but there is an additive that can make the color even darker. There are also additives that can increase skid resistance, improve the sealant’s ability to withstand automotive fluids and other chemicals, make the sealant more resistant to power steering marks, increase the sealant’s flexibility when temperatures change, or improve the uniform distribution of the sand in the mix.
When Performing Asphalt Sealcoating, Does a Sealcoating Contractor Automatically Use Every Possible Additive?
The first thing to understand is that no reputable asphalt paving company will just dump a bunch of additives into the mix and hope for the best. Most asphalt maintenance contractors choose one additive that provides the most important benefit or benefits. If the need is great, your contractor may use more than one additive, but the use of multiple additives needs to be approved by the manufacturer of the sealant and the additives. Normally, manufacturers produce the additives that are to be used with their sealants, so the manufacturer has conducted extensive research on how their products will react when multiple additives are introduced. Furthermore, there are additives that provide more than one benefit, so sealcoating contractors are more likely to recommend a single additive that will offer the desired enhancements. Selecting and using an additive can be complicated, so you should always hire a sealcoating contractor who has the experience, training, and attention to detail that is necessary to deliver the desired results.
Trust MH Greeson, the Experts in Parking Lot Maintenance
Greeson Sealcoating specializes in asphalt maintenance for clients in the Atlanta area and most other towns in North Georgia. Our services include asphalt sealcoating, traffic signs, asphalt crack repair, ADA compliance, parking lot striping, asphalt repair, car stops, and bollard installations. We have impeccable references, an exemplary reputation, and the ability to handle jobs of all sizes. If you need exceptional results at a great price, contact us for a free quote. You can fill out our online form, or you can call our office in Marietta at 770-335-2983.
