Gravel Road Dust Control

[1stDeuce]

Reading this thread looking for solution to our dusty HOA roads...

I moved to CO from MI. I was under the impression that mag and calcium chlorides were MUCH less corrosive to steel than regular road salt... The condition of cars here seems to support that theory... Even cars that travel I70 all winter, where CDOT lays down mag chloride every few hours it seems, are MUCH less rusty than similar cars in MI. Mag chloride does attack chromed plastic, turning it green fairly quickly, but it sure doesn't seem like it's that corrosive to frames, brake lines, etc....

Then again, I wonder how much of the difference is due to humidity levels being really low here... 20% is pretty humid for most of Colorado, whereas in MI, it doesn't get that low except during really cold snaps in the winter... Any salt will attract moisture, and salt solution of all kinds wicks into every crevice in a car... I would think that if Mag Chloride could attract water at 20% humidity, Colorado would have lots of rusted out vehicles, just like MI... I assure you, that's not the case.

I swear I saw a study suggesting that the corrosive effects of Mag Chloride were about 1/10th that of road salt on vehicles... Of course it was probably done by the producer of the Mag Chloride.

I do know that Montezuma county, here in S/W CO uses Mag Chloride on the dirt roads, not Calcium Chloride. I assume this is because it pulls moisture out at a lower humidity level, and therefore works better in this arid climate. I can say that it works awesome to keep the roads dust free, and hard as pavement. Our HOA is trying to get the roads built back up after decades of zero added material and lots of traffic and dust, and when we do, we're probably going to follow the county's example and Mag Chloride treat at least the main roads...

 

[bigtiller]

Why not use Lignin Sulfonate? There is no salt in it. I would think it would be plentiful in Co.

 

[Tomtint]

They have been using Mag on the roads up here for a number of years now. It's brutal on cars and asphalt roads. After 2 years of winter driving, trucks look like they are 20 years old underneath.. the rust is hideous. And the roads are unraveling everywhere.

 

[TMGT]

We've started using asphalt millings on our HOAs roads, it still produces some dust but nowhere near as bad and holds up much better then the gravel we were using. If it's applied at a couple inches and rolled well enough it actually turns into a chip and tar type surface, price per ton is also much lower.

 

[mcfarmall]

There's a place in Bloomingdale, MI that uses "salt water" pumped from oil wells for road dust control.

 

[N2DFire]

We've started using asphalt millings on our HOAs roads, it still produces some dust but nowhere near as bad and holds up much better then the gravel we were using. If it's applied at a couple inches and rolled well enough it actually turns into a chip and tar type surface, price per ton is also much lower.

I was just going to suggest the same thing. We have a short driveway (couple hundred feet) onto one property that we just did this to and we have about a half a load leftover to do the "pad" in front of our shop with. Hoping the July & August sun / temps will help fuse it together even more.

 

[1stDeuce]

Based on Tomtint's observations, perhaps Mag Chloride IS more destructive than road salt, and it's the really low humidity here that keeps cars looking good out here vs. back east. I assume the damage is contrasted against road salt use prior to mag.

Asphalt millings and crushed concrete are actually MORE expensive than gravel here, if you can even find it. Just not enough road rebuilding or infrastructure rebuilding going on to produce any usable quantities. Plus they recycle most asphalt right back into the roads here as they resurface. Lingon Sulfate sounds good too, but I'm not aware of any paper mills within 200 miles of us. We'd be paying to truck it in, at best, which means it's out.

We are checking into putting down "produced water", aka brine, from oil and gas wells. The state and county both say no restrictions apply to our roads. We have heard that it smells a bit like an oilfield when first applied, but on the section of road that's worst, there aren't any houses terribly close to the road. If we can find someone to do it, we may give it a try. We may also try tossing calcium chloride flake on the road, then hitting it with produced water. That should be even better.

I did find a mixing ratio suggestion for calcium chloride to control dust and bind roads at 35%... It takes 86 gallons of water and 450lbs of Calcium Chloride flake to get a 100 gallons of 35% solution. At about $15/55lb bag, that's ~$120, and will cover 400 square yards, or about 133' of our 27' wide road. (The developer built our roads really wide, which is not helping our situation...)

I have not priced Mag Chloride yet, but I believe it's used similarly, and probably priced similarly.

It appears we need at least 4" of "base" or gravel material for either solution to work, and we were down to just about zero this year, so we're building up for now, and just dealing with the dust, unless produced water becomes an option.

 

[TMGT]

Whatever you do don't used crushed concrete if you're worried about dust! They tried that here and it was a disaster.
Suprised millings are more, we've been paying about $7 a ton if I remeber correctl, there's only so, much percentage of recycled asphalt that they are allowed to use in new paving so there's always a lot left over around here.

 

[Fallon]

Whatever you do don't used crushed concrete if you're worried about dust! They tried that here and it was a disaster.
Suprised millings are more, we've been paying about $7 a ton if I remeber correctl, there's only so, much percentage of recycled asphalt that they are allowed to use in new paving so there's always a lot left over around here.

Pushing $25 a ton for recycled asphalt, concrete or new roadbase here in Parker (south Denver) for a truck load or 2.