8 Custom Blends Answers For Dust Control

Custom Blends for Dust Control, Road Stabilization and Soil Stabilization

Custom blends for dust control combine the best of our many solutions to exactly fit the specific needs of our customers across the Western United States and in South America. What works in Arizona may not work in New Mexico or Colorado. It may be too much or not enough for the roads and soil in Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, or Texas. When it comes to stabilizing roads and controlling blowing or fugitive dust, it is not a “one solution fits all” scenario. Many factors are analyzed to determine the best solution for dust abatement: soil type, climate, traffic, budget, etc. Desert Mountain Corporation offers Custom Blends that we have developed in conjunction with our manufacturers.

Here are a few of the questions (answered) that we have received about using Custom Blends:

1. What Does Custom Blending Do?
Custom blended dust control products provide a better solution than one product alone. For instance, calcium chloride and magnesium chloride work by drawing moisture from the air to the soil. Lignosulfonate, polymers, and co-polymers work by “gluing” road base particles together. Combining these products at the right rate increases their individual strengths and lengthens their staying power.

2. What Is A Custom Blend?
One dust suppressant is not always enough. We are able to combine a variety of dust control products to arrive at the right mix for your unique dust control situation. Whether the surface to treat has more fines than gravel, or is made up of large-sized gravel with no fines, or somewhere in between, we can help determine what blend is right for you. When you apply a custom blend to roads and bare soil areas, it immediately goes to work for you by:

– Providing greater safety by increasing driver visibility and decreasing risks caused by loose gravel, soft spots, road roughness, and flying rocks.
– Providing money-saving opportunities in areas ranging from vehicle and road maintenance expenditures (such as blading, watering, and gravel replacement) to improving the engineering properties of soil.
– Providing cleaner air, which leads to better health, better visibility, and much cleaner vehicles, property, vegetation, and living sites.
– Providing an inexpensive, smooth, firm-driving surface, which increases vehicle productivity, decreases fuel consumption, and saves time.
– Providing cleaner air, which leads to better health, better visibility, and much cleaner vehicles, property, vegetation, and living sites.
– Providing stable soil by preventing destructive wind erosion.

3. Where Should Custom Blends Be Used?
Custom blends work to control dust and stabilize aggregate and dirt surfaces on almost any type of road. For example, they can be used on mine haul roads, construction site haul, and forest/timber haul roads, as well as military, agriculture, industrial, and federal project roads. Private and rural roads, parking lot surfaces, industrial, oil field pads, construction staging areas, and airfield helicopter pads are also appropriate surfaces for custom blend applications.

Stabilization of road bases and shoulders is another custom blend benefit. Custom blends help in road base stabilization by increasing base strength and reducing compaction costs. On road shoulders, custom blends will maintain a firm, tight surface increasing shoulder safety and reducing maintenance costs.

4. How Do Custom Blends Work?
By combining products, four stabilizing mechanisms go to work simultaneously:

– Hydroscopicity of magnesium chloride and calcium chloride activates high surface tension strength.
– Particle charge bonding adds strength to the fine ground soil particles.
– Adhesive properties work to bind the soil particles together.
– Chemical composition increases surface compaction, providing the soil particles with greater interlocking strength.

Because of these mechanisms, custom blends are highly effective under most road conditions, in low relative humidity as well as high.

5. How Should I Prepare My Road for Application?
Before spraying roads for dust control, road surface preparation is extremely important, but not necessarily difficult or costly. The better the conditions, the more successful the dust control/soil stabilization application will be.

If the surface is permeable, smooth, firm, and shaped for drainage, it’s ready for application. In other words, before applying a custom blend, make sure that ruts, washboards, potholes, drainage problems, gravel segregation, and hard impervious areas have been rectified. While correct surface preparation need not be difficult, it is very important in the overall success of the dust control treatment.

Blading – will take care of problems like ruts, potholes, wash-boarding, and gravel segregation and will provide a smooth, well-drained surface. That is not necessary if the surface is already smooth, shaped, and evenly mixed.

Compacting – should be performed if blading loosens the surface. Don’t forget to water the surface before compacting. This procedure will restore a dense, tight surface.

Pre-Watering –  (ideally to a depth of 3 to 4 inches) will break the surface tension and allow maximum penetration before applying Desert Mountain’s custom blends. If the surface is too tight for easy water penetration, it should be bladed and re-compacted, creating a firm but easily penetrated surface. For the best results, the surface should be pre-watered several hours before the custom blend application. If an extensive area is to be covered, it can be pre-watered the afternoon or evening before application. But no matter when you pre-water, remember that the surface should be damp at the time of application to extend the life of the application.

6. What If My Road Has Been Treated Before?
Roads previously treated with other products such as waste oils or asphalt products can prevent penetration and adherence of custom-blended dust control products. Desert Mountain can suggest ways to overcome these problems.

7. How Do I Get The Best Results?
Custom blends perform best when applied to a soil or gravel road surface that is smooth, firm, and shaped for drainage. The road should be pre-watered to a depth of 3 to 4 inches creating a surface that is moist but not saturated.

8. What About Traffic?
Traffic will have little effect on the treatment during application but should be held off if possible until the dust control solution has penetrated. If traffic cannot be held up, it should be slowed to around 10 miles per hour to minimize splashing and coating on vehicles.

These are only a few of the questions that we regularly receive about our custom blended products. You can learn more about the specific products here. If you have any additional questions, please reach out to your area representative, contact us via email or call us at (877) 718-3878.

All Soil is Not the Same – Neither are Our Solutions