Bitumen

Taa. The stuff they use on roads must be very different. This stuff came in a plastic bag.

The stuff they use on roads and the stuff in plastic bags is nearly the same but in bags it has had emulsified bitumen added. This has to dry out to set whereas road bitumen simply has to cool down.

I have seen someone very effectively put bagged stuff on a large steel sheet and heat the under-surface using a gas burner. Most of the water evaporated leaving fairly hot, fairly dry stuff which set relatively speedily.

Interesting. Thanks.

In message , Phil L writes

In winter, I put the bag in the front footwell of the car and turned the heater on full while I "prepared the hole".

It seems to have worked well.

The contractors have carelessly left a bag of this stuff outside. Ahem .... "Please note that the product will take longer to set in hot weather" is on the bag. I thought it would be the other way round.

Yes, they are bastards for that trick.

We had a leak under the public footpath, level with the boundary between ourselves and the attached semi. United utilities arrived while I was at work, dug it up, repaired the leak and took the opportunity to fit new stop taps for both houses. This meant that the old flags wouldn't fit and they had to take them away to cut accesses for the lids. They temporarily filled the hole with that junk.

Now, I knew nothing of this when I got home in semi darkness. I reversed into the drive, got out at least 8 feet into my drive and nearly 30 across from where they'd done the work. The phone was ringing, so I rushed in and answered it. I was on the phone for around three quarters of an hour and pacing around the hall. At the end of the call, I turned on the hall light and found bitumen marks all over the carpet.

Further investigation revealed that (presumably) people walking up and down the pavement had spread the stuff at least 30 feet in each direction and there was somehow even a considerable amount in my drive! I'd of course got a piece stuck to my shoe.

Horrible stuff.

SteveW

Yeah, its all over the bloody footpath here. Not the stuff they used to fill the gap, the stuff they could have swept up but didn't.

Some years ago I was on a call at XXXXXX Bank in Bristol. Their regional HQ had solid marble floors in reception, and brand new tarmac outside.

It also had a cleaner on her knees with a rag and solvent. At least it comes off easily, but I think she was going to be there for a while.

Andy