Chips again

Until the early ‘80s road surface dressing was mainly done with hot tar – now replaced with hot bitumen or cold bituminous emulsion.

Tar is now almost unobtainable and is recognised as quite hazardous.

The reasons for resurfacing with chips is to seal the existing surface against rain and frost and also to provide a new non-slip finish at an economic cost.

Precoated chippings are used for most surface dressing in the UK which achieves an almost 100 per cent adhesion rate and avoids the dust and flying chips associated with this operation.

Roy Whitehead
Bressay