It’s rainy season here in Florida. And it’s not uncommon for the afternoon rainstorm to show up early, surprising the crew whose weather app insisted the rain wouldn’t start for another hour or two.
After milling a pavement for a maintenance job, brooming and sweeping the surface is vital to allow tack and/or the new lift to adhere properly. Everyone should know to read the tack manufacturer’s guidelines (or the department of transportation’s specs) for how much time to allow tack to break before backing the paver into position and placing that smooth surface layer of asphalt. But if you find yourself staring at a pricy film of tack on a project being inundated with early rain, what do you do?
Everyone has weather-monitoring apps these days, but weather events can still surprise the crew. And no matter how perfectly you think you can time it, sometimes rainclouds blow in before the app says they should.
Here’s your scenario: The tack has turned the perfect black, rain pours down and mixes things up just enough to turn the tack brown again but not enough to wash your pricy product away. The supervisor can thank his lucky stars that the material is still in place, but he’s looking at refreshed tack.
Never fear. Your DOT has advice for this. If you’re on a state project, there’ll be guidance. If you’re on a commercial project, you can wait for the tack to break again, returning to the rich and sticky black that accepts the new layer nicely. Pave on.