Equipment World Digital Magazine
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/757428
EquipmentWorld.com | December 2016 51 patching two or three areas 12 and 15 inches deep, and the city engi- neer said 'What am I going to do? I didn't know this road was going to fall apart,'" Alston says. "I told him we could fix it. We dropped in and did them a favor and mixed the road." The city engineer was impressed, Alston said, and that favor is what led Tyrone to consider FDR for an 8-mile section of Senoia Road; a roadway that serves as the main street for the small town. While get- ting the contract was relatively easy, and the FDR work was straightfor- ward, navigating the surroundings gave Atlanta Paving challenges. The road traveled through a di- verse landscape. A rock quarry, as- phalt plant and several warehouses were on one end, along with a ce- ment supply terminal. With multiple trucks going in and out of these businesses, dealing with traffic was a significant problem. At the other end were high-end houses, and at near center, were the town hall, an elementary school, a historic cemetery and a soccer park. In addition, there were two railroad crossings. "Everybody else looked at the job thinking it was scary and a lot to deal with," Alston says. "But with some planning and some detours, we were able to work a lot of the traffic out and not bother people nearly as much as was expected." Equipment finesse While Atlanta Paving uses a Wirtgen 2500 S for the pulverizing and mix- ing for the bulk of its FDR work, Alston says it takes multiple ma- chines to provide quality results. "We always use a sheepsfoot roller on our jobs," she says. "The Georgia DOT doesn't require and spec them, but for compactive ef- forts, especially when you're doing 10 and 12 inches of material, put- ting that sheepsfoot roller on it is just a necessity." And to finish off the pavement, Alston says a milling machine is their secret weapon. "We keep a Roadtec 700 milling machine with every mixing crew, because you're either milling off before or milling excess material off at the end," she explains. "Everyone wonders why our pavements are perfectly smooth. It's because we take the effort to make sure it is. It's amazing what the mill- ing machine will do for trimming that last little quarter of an inch that needs to come out." Alston says using the milling machine doesn't negate the work of motor grader operators, it just provides that final brush stroke of finish work. "The key to FDR is getting it set quickly," she says. "So, no matter how quick your grader operator is, you're going to have to set that ma- terial. Chipping it out with a milling machine is the answer." Y O U R M A C H I N E MAXIMIZE MC-MAX technology with CONSTRUCTION SOLUTIONS topconpositioning.com/MAX 3D-MC MAX Make tighter turns, cut smoother grades, and get the most out of your machine. This revolutionary system features our advanced blade technology that lets you work faster and smarter than ever before. With intelligent automation that intuitively guides you to cut the right depth, grade, and slope every time. And it's versatile enough to work on just about any machine. For more info, visit topconpositioning.com/MAX © 2016 Topcon Positioning Group Untitled-35 1 11/17/16 9:19 AM