Aquiline MPC chains on new asphalt

SmallChange · Nov 1, 2020

I bought Aquiline MPC chains to help with snow removal especially considering I get ice buildup on my driveway. This was with a gravel driveway. But then I got the unexpected opportunity to pave the driveway in asphalt, so I now have beautiful 6 month old asphalt. I think I would probably have bought less aggressive chains if I'd known.

These have square bars welded across the working faces of all the links. I think of them as almost like studded but not quite. They're box pattern.

Are these *perfectly safe* to use on my beautiful new driveway? Any limitations or special advice, like don't ever let wheels slip, don't ever use one wheel braking for turns, etc?

Aquiline says they won't damage it, but I hear warnings about chains in general, so just checking. It's one of those things that "just try and see" isn't gonna work. Here's what they say:

"Aquilineｮ Multi Purpose Chains are exactly what is needed when clearance is an issue and you require excellent traction.
They are aggressive giving the traction needed for snow removal, but will not damage the asphalt.
Manufactured from hardened alloy steel, featuring a square link with wear bars, these chains are both durable and lightweight, and with the box pattern design will not fall down between the lugs of the tire."

Thank you!

Cougsfan · Nov 1, 2020

The colder the temperature; the less the chance of hurting the asphalt as it will become harder. All asphalt isn't the same. Along with other factors, it's hardness depends largely on how much crude oil they put into the mix; the more oil, the softer it will be. It will also harden more with time. I'd go out with a large screwdriver and poke it into the asphalt. If it will dent it easily, so will your tire chains.

Rebeldad1 · Nov 1, 2020

Any asphalt takes time to cure.your call on using chains. If you arnt removing the snow it should be fine.
Maybe a pair of bolt on skids to keep from digging into the driveway if you are removing the snow.

coolconnection · Nov 1, 2020

SmallChange said:
I bought Aquiline MPC chains to help with snow removal especially considering I get ice buildup on my driveway. This was with a gravel driveway. But then I got the unexpected opportunity to pave the driveway in asphalt, so I now have beautiful 6 month old asphalt. I think I would probably have bought less aggressive chains if I'd known.

These have square bars welded across the working faces of all the links. I think of them as almost like studded but not quite. They're box pattern.
Are these *perfectly safe* to use on my beautiful new driveway? Any limitations or special advice, like don't ever let wheels slip, don't ever use one wheel braking for turns, etc?
Aquiline says they won't damage it, but I hear warnings about chains in general, so just checking. It's one of those things that "just try and see" isn't gonna work. Here's what they say:
"Aquilineｮ Multi Purpose Chains are exactly what is needed when clearance is an issue and you require excellent traction.
They are aggressive giving the traction needed for snow removal, but will not damage the asphalt.
Manufactured from hardened alloy steel, featuring a square link with wear bars, these chains are both durable and lightweight, and with the box pattern design will not fall down between the lugs of the tire."
Thank you!

Try your tractor without chains first. My last tractor had turf tires on it for 10 years and never needed chains on my asphalt driveway and I have a huge hill to climb and it was fine (350 foot driveway). Now the new tractor has R4 tires so I grooved them just to help me out. I haven't used it yet in the snow to be honest but this winter I will see. The thing is I think is how close you plow to the surface of the asphalt material to get traction. I have basically a giant squeegee on my plow edge that cleans the snow off right to the surface. By doing this I get good traction with the tractor tires. I can see a metal plow edge tearing up new asphalt driveway especially if is set to low and connects with it somehow. I do salt my hill after I plow to help keep the ice away. The latest university study says salt will not hurt asphalt surfaces but it will mess up concrete. So you don't have to waste your money on the high end salt for asphalt if you use it, I did use the good stuff for awhile and now I don't and it shows no adverse effects. Good luck.

Rustyiron · Nov 1, 2020

I'm with cc^^^^
You don't mention your location but you should be able to scrape asphalt clean to where your tires are on the asphalt. And it's a good practice to "plow with the storm" that is do it every 6-8" if you have trouble at 9". Usually after a few hours in the sun the pavement is near bare and dry. You may need to pay attention to any areas where melting snow would run across the driveway and freeze at night. Push the snow back farther in these spots, but a little salt is much more effective on pavement than gravel.

dstig1 · Nov 1, 2020

Terrain matters too. I have significant hills and inevitably end up spinning at least slightly when pushing uphill. With all 4 wheels chained and in 4wd. R4s are like racing slicks in the snow and ice so chains are 100% necessary for me. Over time you are going to score your driveway, asphalt or concrete, if you plow with chains. If you need them on, you will just have to live with it, but yes, I would go for less aggressive ones to reduce the damage potential.

mcmopar · Nov 2, 2020

SmallChange said:
I bought Aquiline MPC chains to help with snow removal especially considering I get ice buildup on my driveway. This was with a gravel driveway. But then I got the unexpected opportunity to pave the driveway in asphalt, so I now have beautiful 6 month old asphalt. I think I would probably have bought less aggressive chains if I'd known.

These have square bars welded across the working faces of all the links. I think of them as almost like studded but not quite. They're box pattern.

Are these *perfectly safe* to use on my beautiful new driveway? Any limitations or special advice, like don't ever let wheels slip, don't ever use one wheel braking for turns, etc?

Aquiline says they won't damage it, but I hear warnings about chains in general, so just checking. It's one of those things that "just try and see" isn't gonna work. Here's what they say:

"Aquilineｮ Multi Purpose Chains are exactly what is needed when clearance is an issue and you require excellent traction.
They are aggressive giving the traction needed for snow removal, but will not damage the asphalt.
Manufactured from hardened alloy steel, featuring a square link with wear bars, these chains are both durable and lightweight, and with the box pattern design will not fall down between the lugs of the tire."

Thank you!

I purchased the same tire chains as you have. I have a paved driveway and I drove my tractor on it for a while, with the chains on. One day I was looking at my driveway and could see every track that the tractor left. The chains marked the driveway, I then looked closely at my cement barn floor and also saw small divots in the concrete. The driveway blacktop is 4 years old and the concrete is 24 years old. The chains worked well in the dirt but not on any of my pavement. I also have gouge marks in the driveway from spinning when I used the FEL to remove a pile of snow, the chains chewed right through the snow and ice. I removed the chains and probably will not use them anytime soon. Just my experience.

LouNY · Nov 2, 2020

If you do not spin your tires you should be fine with those chains.
Any other style is likely to do more damage then what you have.
If you get "rubber" blade for your plow and plow frequently you may not need to chain,
any wet packed snow or ice may change that quickly.
While salt will melt snow and ice at mild winter temps, it doesn't when it gets cold.
A bit of sand or other abrasive material works,
from a Cargill site.

Rock salt is a staple for most winter maintenance deicing programs, but at what temperature does it become ineffective?

Salt will “work,” i.e. it will melt ice, all the way down to its eutectic temperature of -6 0F. However, the “practical working temperature” of salt is generally considered to be higher than this. In the highway deicing world the practical working temperature of salt is generally considered to be above 15 0F or even 20 0F. There are two reasons for this.

One is that the amount of ice that can be melted per pound of salt (or any other deicer) decreases with temperature. At 30 0F, 1 pound of salt will melt about 46 pounds of ice. At 20 0F, 1 pound of salt will only melt about 9 pounds of ice. And at +1 0F, 1 pound of salt will only melt about 4 pounds of ice. So the colder it gets, the more salt is needed to provide a given amount of ice melting action.

The second reason is that salt’s ice melting action slows as the temperature drops. This would be less of an issue for applications where time is not critical (e.g. if one put salt on their snowy sidewalk and was not in a hurry to clear it), but in applications where removal of the snow is desired as soon as possible, such as highway deicing, the ice melting speed of rock salt becomes impractically slow at colder temperatures.

SmallChange · Nov 2, 2020

mcmopar said:
I purchased the same tire chains as you have. I have a paved driveway and I drove my tractor on it for a while, with the chains on. One day I was looking at my driveway and could see every track that the tractor left. The chains marked the driveway, I then looked closely at my cement barn floor and also saw small divots in the concrete. The driveway blacktop is 4 years old and the concrete is 24 years old. The chains worked well in the dirt but not on any of my pavement. I also have gouge marks in the driveway from spinning when I used the FEL to remove a pile of snow, the chains chewed right through the snow and ice. I removed the chains and probably will not use them anytime soon. Just my experience.

YIKES!! Wow, I'm sorry to hear that's what happened, but thank you for sharing your experience. I am definitely going to try to make snow removal work without the chains!

Would you like a second set of those chains? No? No, I guess not....

By the way, I live between Baltimore and Philadelphia, so not an area with difficult winters, though I have seen 22" once.

I have had two challenges with ice. The one that creates the most work is that I have a 40' by 40' parking area that is immediately adjacent to the house on the north side. The house is 25' high. So, this area is mostly in shade, and is even surrounded by retaining wall then high bushes on one side, and an 8' high stockade fence on the other. Some winters it will build up an inch or two of solid ice, and I have a really hard time ever clearing it.

The other ice challenge may go away this winter. With the gravel driveway, the tire ruts going down the hill would fill with snow which gets compacted into ice, and the ruts are deep enough and the hill steep enough that they don't get great sunshine either. However now that it's paved there aren't ruts, and water won't collect exactly where the tires go. So we will see.