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High Friction Surfacing Gives Your Pavements The Skid Resistance You Need

By Margaret Murphy


Pavements can be accorded a surface treatment system composed of a material that is tough, polish and abrasion resistant aggregates and they are bonded to the surface using a resin. This form of surface treatment can either be hot or cold applied and has been used across the globe. These anti-skid surfaces can be achieved through treatment systems known as high friction surfacing. Basically, it is used so as to add skid resistance and lower the braking distance.

The power of reducing braking distance can potential lower accidents. The anti-skid treatment may be placed at various stages on the road, like pedestrian crossing, roundabout and road junction, on road stretch with high accident rates and near traffic lights. Various types of resins are used to bind the aggregate material have improved performance and durability. By adding this type of treatment, this surfaces saves money as well as lives on the road.

Apart from enhancing skid resistance on road surfaces, it can be used for traffic calming, lane delineating, decorative reasons and for bike paths. Surfacing can be made through either cold or hot application. The hot enforced binds the material onto the surface by adhesion because of the heat application as the cold applied get attached on the road surface by chemical bond.

Due to its anti-skid properties, this treatment can be done on road surfaces at different points. Common areas where it is normally used are such as horizontal curves and ramps, steep grades, bus stop points, intersection approaches, bridge decks and surfaces where icing is common. Such area often require higher friction making the anti-skidding treatment more ideal hence reducing accident rates. This is because this material is made such that it can achieve high tolerance to abrasion from vehicle tires. The material is also resilient to polishing or being smoothened.

Before the application of the abrasive resistant material, various precautions need to be met in order to achieve quality adhesion. First, the pavements need to be in good condition without cracking and scaling. For open graded surfaces, they can no longer act as open-graded after installation. They may require double layer application in order to achieve the adequate thickness for binding.

Some other requirements are that the pavement surfaces be clean and dry for the application. Surfaces that are made of concrete have to be shot-blasted before applying in order to achieve a better adhesion. Also, the surfaces have to be free of grease, oils, and the likes.

Once the aggregate has been installed, the excess should be removed from the now new surface before opening it to the traffic. This is effectively done using a power bloom and then compressed by air. Additional sweeping may be done over the next several days to remove the loose stones.

Installations of the anti-skidding materials have many advantages not only being skid resistance. Unlike placing and removing the existing pavement, installation of aggregated materials are not expensive undertakings. They can also be performed on nearly any type of pavements and they can be done on short road closures say 4 and 6 hours.




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