Common Questions

Residential sealcoating runs about $0.15 to $0.25 per square foot, which is the rate Black Widow has published for years. What moves it inside that range is how much crack filling the drive needs first and whether the high-wear areas want a second coat. Long rural drives are measured rather than guessed at, and the number is fixed before we start.

Every two to three years in Eau Claire and northwestern Wisconsin. Freeze and thaw here does more damage than sun does, and the cycle matters more than it would further south. Sealing every year is a waste of money.

Roughly May through early October in Eau Claire and northwestern Wisconsin, and it depends more on overnight lows than on the daytime high. Sealer needs warm pavement and a dry cure, so late-season jobs depend on the weather holding.

Usually 24 hours for a car and 48 before anything heavy, or before turning your wheels while stopped, which is what scuffs fresh sealer. We give you the actual number on the day, because it moves with the weather.

No. Coal tar sealer is perfectly legal in Eau Claire and a good deal of this region still uses it, which is exactly why it's worth asking. We run an asphalt emulsion instead, Pitch Black, by choice. The reason is the science rather than the rulebook. The US Geological Survey sampled streams around Milwaukee and traced somewhere between 42 and 94 percent of the PAHs in the sediment back to coal tar sealant dust. Minnesota banned the stuff statewide in 2014. We would rather not put it on a driveway that drains toward the Chippewa.

Sealed asphalt needs 24 to 48 hours before traffic goes back on it. On a lot that can't close, where that time comes from is part of what the estimate works out, so tell us which hours and which areas you can't lose.

Sometimes yes and sometimes no, and it depends on whether the base under it has failed. Tight surface cracks seal fine. Alligatored areas that flex under your foot have to be cut out and patched first, and no amount of sealer fixes them. A photo of the worst area is usually enough to tell the two apart.

Square footage and depth, mostly. A pothole that stops at the surface is a different job from one where the base underneath has gone, and you cannot tell which you have until it is opened. What we can tell you before that: several repairs done on one visit come down substantially per repair, because the trip and the mobilisation are already paid for. The assessment is free.

Almost always because it was filled rather than repaired: no clean cut, no removal of the failed base, and nothing bonding it to the asphalt around it. The failure was underneath and it's still there.

Yes, and quickly. Our newest review is a sinkhole repaired within seven days. A sinkhole means material is being washed out from underneath, usually by drainage or a failed pipe, so the repair includes finding out why.

Repair, until roughly a quarter to a third of the surface has failed. Past that you're patching patches and an overlay becomes better value. The estimate measures how much of your surface has actually failed.

Hot mix takes traffic as soon as it has cooled, usually a few hours. That's the material rather than a schedule: what a specific repair means for your lot is one of the things the estimate works out.

It is priced per stall, and the thing that moves it most is whether the old lines can be followed. A straightforward restripe over a layout that is still visible is the cheap end. A new layout costs more per stall because it has to be measured and set out from scratch. ADA stalls cost more than standard ones: they are wider, they carry an access aisle and they need the symbol and the signage.

Every one to three years in Eau Claire and northwestern Wisconsin, depending on traffic, plowing and sun. Lots that get plowed hard lose lines fastest, because the blade takes the paint with the snow. If your accessible stalls are hard to read from a car, it's due.

We mark accessible stalls, access aisles and symbols to the required dimensions and can advise on stall counts and signage. We're a paving contractor rather than a compliance consultant, so for a formal audit you want a specialist, but for getting the markings right we do this constantly.

Yes, and in that order, at the same visit. Sealer covers existing lines, so striping first wastes the paint. Doing both together also costs less than two separate visits.

Yes. Arrows, fire lane markings, no parking, loading zones, reserved stall numbers, crosswalks and custom text.

Yes. We stripe running tracks and sports courts, which is measured layout work at a different level of precision. It's on our athletic surfaces page.

Thickness, reinforcement and access are what move it. A slab that has to carry vehicles is thicker than one that carries feet, steel adds cost and adds life, and a pour a truck cannot reach has to be barrowed, which is labour. Removing the old surface is quoted separately rather than hidden in the rate, so you can see what each part costs.

Concrete costs roughly two to three times as much up front and lasts longer with less maintenance. Asphalt is cheaper, goes down faster, handles frost movement better, and needs sealing every two to three years. Which one suits comes down to the loading, the frost and the budget.

Yes, including radius work, formed and poured to spec. It is priced by the linear foot, and a curve costs more than a straight run because the forms have to be built to the radius.

Because they're usually sized to the dumpster instead of to the truck. The worst loading a pad ever sees is the front axle of a loaded refuse truck on a hot day, and a slab poured for the container alone isn't built for that.

It depends on the mix, and that is worth asking about rather than assuming. On a standard pour: foot traffic in 24 to 48 hours, vehicles after about seven days, heavy trucks at 28 days for a full-strength cure. Where the schedule will not take seven days, we spec a 4,500 PSI exterior mix instead. One of those is a loading dock apron we poured with tied rebar in a working parking lot: customers were driving on it three days later. Whichever mix your job gets, the window goes in the scope up front so you can plan around it before the pour.

The concrete and the asphalt around it are priced and sequenced together, so the joint between them is somebody's responsibility rather than nobody's.

Yes. Driveways, parking lots and walkways, residential and commercial, around Eau Claire.

Before the snow flies. Call, tell us about the property, and we'll talk through what it needs for the winter.

It can, and most of the damage is avoidable. A blade set too low scrapes the surface and takes the sealer with it, which undoes in one pass what sealing was meant to protect. A blade that catches the lip of a catch basin frame lifts it, and that becomes a spring repair rather than a winter inconvenience. Neither is difficult to avoid; both come down to knowing what is under the snow.

Because that is where the snow gets piled and that is where the meltwater runs. A pile put in the wrong corner sends water back across the lot, where it refreezes overnight and thaws again the next afternoon. That spot then takes the freeze-thaw cycle dozens of times in a single winter while the rest of the lot takes it a handful, which is why one area ages faster than everything around it.

Yes, once it has cured, and a sealed surface actually plows better than a raw one because the blade rides on a tighter surface. What matters is blade height and what the plow is riding on: fresh sealer scraped by steel set too low comes off in strips. Shoes or a rubber edge deal with that, and they are worth asking about whoever does the plowing.

Salt does far less to asphalt than it does to concrete, which is worth knowing before anybody spends money on the wrong problem. What salt really does to a lot is keep the surface wet and cycling through freezing rather than letting it stay frozen. Water in an open crack, freezing and thawing repeatedly, is what actually takes pavement apart. Sealed surfaces and filled cracks are the defense, not a different de-icer.

Finds it, usually the hard way. A basin frame that has settled below the asphalt catches a blade coming across it, and a frame that has been lifted proud of the surface catches it harder. Either way the impact loosens the collar around the structure, water gets under it, and by spring the ring of asphalt around the rim is coming apart. A basin that is level with the surface going into winter is the cheapest thing you can do about that.

It helps, and it is what stops an edge getting broken off. Asphalt is at its weakest at the edge because there is nothing beside it holding it in, and a blade that runs off the pavement into the grass takes a piece of the edge with it. Markers at the corners, at the catch basins and along any island cost almost nothing and save the repair.