The street leading to my neighborhood has been undergoing a complete resurfacing for a few weeks now. They did lots of prep work, put down a new black top, and finally painted the lines. Everything was put back together and it was lovely when they left. But then about a week later they came back and shut down the entire road for most of the day so a truck could slowly spray sand on the road. This was not a sanding truck like the city would use for ice or snow, but more like a water truck with nozzles on a bar across the rear. It sprayed a rather fine sand, a substantial amount that accumulated on the road and remained for days. As far as I could tell, that’s all they did, just put the sand down and that’s it.
What’s the purpose of the sanding?
I found this blurb from the Nation Forest Service “Asphalt Seal-Coat Treatments” … it talks about a wide variety of asphalt seals including sand. In a nut shell"
Well … it sure could … asphalt is just goop and aggregate … it would still be fresh and pliable in a week … it’s not like concrete that sets up like rock … the sand packs down into the goop and forms a protective seal over the top of the road … I’ve seen along California farm roads them just squirting goop down and covering it with 1/4" minus … let the traffic pack it all together …
yes, but at least in my experience, the sand/stone treatment is done within 48 hours, that is why i was asking him/her how much of the sand remained on the road
It was visible on the road for at least a few days. Loose and shifting with the passing cars. Maybe that was just the excess and the point was to pack some into the fresh asphalt, but it had been about a week since they finished striping the road and much longer since the asphalt went down. Maybe three weeks.