Last Updated on Wednesday, 15 February 2012 16:19
Windsor Fuel Company (WFC) and Caltrans District 3 were awarded the prestigious California Chip Seal Association Contractor Excellence Award on Friday at the Annual Chip Seal Workshop. The award was for a Terminal Blend Hot Applied chip seal installed by WFC in District 3 last September. The job was near Georgetown on El Dorado 193 from MP 12.7-21.7.
Caltrans was very happy with the work and recomended WFC for the award. Veera Nanugonda, the Resident Engineer for the project wrote a letter of recomendation to the chip seal association and stated, "As Resiednt Engineer for this project, I would like to commend the quality, workmanship, and professionalism of Windsor Fuel Company during the completion of this project." He continued later saying, "Windsor Fuel Company should be commended for its efforts to have a safe work zone. As a resident engineer, it was a pleasure to work with (WFC) during this project." For a complete copy of Veera's letter please click here.
The 2012 California Chip Seal Association Workshop was attended by over 225 people including contractors, city and county officials and staff and Caltrans.
Thursday, 26 January 2012 15:19
When Caltrans needed an emergency asphalt paving repair on I-5 in January in Redding, they called on Tullis. Tullis called Telfer Oil Company for some Evotherm Warm Mix Asphalt (WMA) additive to make the project successful and the rest is history.
On the nights of January 12-13, 2012 Tullis Inc. paved I-5 going northbound through Redding with just over 3300 tons of Warm Mix Asphalt using Meadwestvaco’s Evotherm as a placement and workability aid. Conventional mix wasn’t an option due to the 35°F air temps and 40°F pavement temps. Caltrans wanted the assurance of success under adverse conditions and asked for Evotherm.
The mix was a gap graded PG 64-28PM with 15% RAP produced by Northstate Asphalt (a Tullis Company). Telfer Oil Company was supplied the Evotherm® product and equipment to Northstate. Evotherm is easily metered and injected into the asphalt line at the hot plant using a skid mounted controller unit.
One of the challenges on this job was the short time frame from notice of job to start of the repair work. Tullis and Telfer found out about the job on Friday January 6th about 3:00 PM. By Monday, the Evotherm equipment and material was on site and by Tuesday it had been approved by Caltrans as meeting all the necessary MPQP requirements. Milling commenced Tuesday night and paving started Thursday.
The mix was produced between 285°F - 295°F. Temperatures behind the screed and during rolling were as low 220°F with completion being achieved by 190°F. Evotherm provides the mix with the ability to be paved in cooler temperatures with greater workability.
On the jobsite it was noted that by using WMA nothing had changed in paving practice except for the fact that Tullis was able to pave in conditions that normally would have been considered unacceptable by the State. Caltrans and Tullis are very happy with the final product.
Caltrans recently approved a change order by MCK Construction on a night project in Napa County to use TruPave in lieu of an asphlat rubber chip seal. Trupave falls under the category "Paving Mat" in Section 88-1.02K of the 2010 Caltrans Standard Specifications. Although admittedly the newer of the two materials considered for this project, Trupave has been performing in CA since 2001 and delivers superior tensile strength and reflective crack benefits along with recyclability and millability.
Trupave is installed by the Telfer Companies as well as other trained installers throughout CA. For more information on Trupave click here.
