Like every other part of the home, asphalt driveways are eventually going to need a little bit of care and attention.
Every minute of every day Mother Nature is conspiring to degrade, disintegrate, and breakdown your asphalt driveway.
Rain, snow, wind and weather, dirt and debris, and even just driving and parking your vehicles on the driveway are going to leave it a little worse for wear.
The trick is to get out on top of these driveway problems when they are still just minor issues, leveraging preventative care and maintenance solutions like after sealant to keep your driveway in just as good as brand-new condition.
Cracks and Crevices
Asphalt is a fantastic material for driveways, known to hold its shape and form for years and years.
Unfortunately, like anything else man-made, over a long enough stretch out time asphalt is going to start to “come apart at the seams”.
Cracks and crevices always start off as tiny little spider web problems you probably don’t even notice when you pull your vehicle onto your driveway and park it for the day.
Over time, though, water is inevitably going to work its way into those tiny little cracks and those tiny little crevices and turn them into bigger problems.
Combine that with the freezing cold temperatures we get here in Canada during the winter and those cracks and crevices can grow exponentially between the fall and the spring, destroying your driveway along the way.
Asphalt sealant (applied correctly) seals away those cracks and crevices and prevents that water damage from happening in the first place.
Discoloration and Degradation
The sun beats down on your asphalt driveway every single day, hammering it with ultraviolet light that will degrade and discolor your driveway in just a few short months.
All you have to do to see this in action is look at a brand-new asphalt driveway compared to one that’s at least a few months old.
The brand-new driveway is going to be a deep, dark asphalt color whereas the months old driveway is going to look bland, dull, and great.
Compound that UV damage over a few years and it’s not hard to understand why older driveways look the way they do.
That UV damage isn’t just cosmetic, either.
The sun’s rays are literally working to degrade the actual asphalt itself as well as the chemical products used to make the asphalt driveway as effective as is. That weakens the driveway, allows cracks and crevices to get worse, and conspires with water damage to compromise your driveway in a hurry.
Damage to the Curbs
We’ve all hit curbs made of asphalt with our vehicles before, clipping power curbs and maybe taking tiny chunks of asphalt out of them at the same time.
While a glancing blow every now and again probably isn’t going to destroy your driveway immediately enough of those compounded over time can start to add up.
Proper asphalt sealant is going to smooth over those missing chips and chunks, restore the structural integrity of those curves, and help to better protect the structure of your driveway from these kinds of glancing blows moving forward.
You’ll also be able to dress up your driveway and make it look just as good as brand-new with sealant applied to the surface and all curb areas, too.
Ruts and Potholes
Driving your vehicles along the same path across your driveway and parking them in the same spot will inevitably cause ruts to establish in your asphalt.
It’s just the nature of this material, a material that is particularly hardy and resilient but one that is inevitably going to give way when you’re moving multi time vehicles across its surface over the same exact area time and time again.
Potholes and heaving are other problems you can expect to have to contend with, especially since we have the kinds of winters we have here in Canada.
Potholes and heaving can lead to drainage problems, huge cracks and crevices, and physical damage to your driveway that compromises it in a hurry, too.
These are all reasons to consider sealing your driveway every few years, restoring its surface back to brand-new condition, and extending the life of your driveway dramatically at the same time.
If that’s something you’re interested in and you’d like some questions about this kind of project answered, contact us today for more details about our residential driveway sealing service and a 100% free (and zero obligation) estimate.