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Crack Filling and Sealing in Baldwin

Crack Filling and Sealing in Baldwin, Wisconsin.

Hot rubber crack filling for parking lots in Baldwin. Routed where it needs it, filled at 400 degrees, priced by the foot of crack rather than by the acre.

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4.7 from 21 Google reviews

About 50 minutes west of Eau Claire on I-94. The estimate is free.

A web of freshly filled cracks running across a parking lot, the rubber still glossy.
4.7 Google ratingFrom 21 reviews
400°F Applied atDirect-fire rubber
9% Water expandsEvery time it freezes

Working in Baldwin

A lot at the interchange takes loaded trucks over the same path all day, and a crack in that path opens faster than one out in the parking rows. St. Croix County's ground is glacial moraine, anything from clay through to boulders, and frost works it every winter. Wide cracks get routed to a clean face first, and the rubber goes in at 400 degrees so it reaches the bottom of the crack and bonds to the walls. Cold pour out of a pail lifts out in strips by spring.

From our jobs

Job Photos

The crack crew's trucks and melter working a tree-lined road, road work sign up
The crack crew working a town road
The company flatbed and the yellow crack-seal melter on a road shoulder, two crew in hi-vis working ahead of it
The melter on site, crew working ahead of it

All job photos

Hot rubber vs. cold pour

The stuff in a jug at the hardware store is cold pour. It goes in as a liquid, dries, shrinks, and sits in the crack like a rubber band laid in a trench. It's not bonded to anything. The first hard freeze pulls the crack open, the filler has nothing holding it to the walls, and it lifts out in a strip. Most people have seen this happen and assumed it was a bad batch. Hot-applied rubber goes in at around 400 degrees. At that temperature it's thin enough to run down into the crack instead of bridging it, and hot enough to melt into the asphalt faces on either side. When it cools it has bonded to the walls of the crack, so when the crack moves, the filler moves with it.

Cold pour

The jug from the hardware store, and what a cheap quote uses

  • Sits in the crack rather than bonding to it
  • Shrinks as it cures, leaving a channel down the middle
  • Pulls out in strips after the first hard winter
  • Cheap enough that it gets redone every year, which isn't cheap

Hot-applied rubber

What comes off our kettle

  • Flows to the bottom of the crack at 400 degrees
  • Melts into the asphalt faces and bonds to both walls
  • Stays flexible, so it moves when the crack moves
  • Holds for years, not for one season

This is the one place where the cheaper option isn't a smaller version of the right one. It's a different product doing a different thing.

What Decides the Price in Baldwin

Priced by the foot of crack, not by the area of the surface, because that's what actually drives the work. Usually done as part of a sealcoating job, where it costs less than it would on its own.

Commercial lot

Per linear foot

Measured on site

  • Depends on crack width, depth and how much routing it needs
  • Most lots are quoted as a lump sum after a walk

Cracks wider than about an inch and a half, or ones that have broken into a network, are past filling. Those get cut out and patched rather than filled with something that will not hold.

How the Work Goes in Baldwin

Done before sealer, always: sealer can't bridge an open crack.

Clean the crack out

Blown out with compressed air, vegetation and old failed filler removed. Rubber won't bond to dirt any more than sealer will.

Rout the wide ones

Wide or heavily worked cracks get cut to a consistent reservoir so the filler has a proper shape to sit in. Not every crack needs it; the ones that do are the ones that have already failed once.

Fill hot

Direct-fire kettle, rubber at 400 degrees, wanded into the crack until it's full from the bottom up rather than skinned over at the top.

Squeegee and let it set

Struck off flush or slightly banded over, depending on the surface. Sets hard enough to drive on in under an hour in most conditions.

Booking the last of the sealcoating season now · Call (715) 450-9897

Questions We Get in Baldwin

What Baldwin calls us about, answered straight.

More questions answered
Baldwin's 50 minutes out. Do you come this far for a lot?
For commercial lots, yes. It's about 49 miles straight out I-94 to Exit 19, right around 50 minutes. Send the address and what the lot needs and we'll set up a time to walk it. The estimate is free.
How much does crack filling cost?
It is priced by the linear foot of crack rather than by the size of the surface, so a big driveway with four cracks costs less than a small one that has opened up all over. Width matters too: anything wide enough to need routing out first takes longer. On a driveway it is usually included up to a point when it is done with a sealcoat rather than billed on its own.
Why does the temperature of the crack filler matter?
At 400 degrees the rubber is thin enough to reach the bottom of the crack and hot enough to melt into the asphalt on both sides, so it bonds. Cold pour filler can't do either, which is why it lifts out in strips after a winter.
Should I fill cracks before sealcoating or after?
Before, always. Sealer is a thin wear layer and it can't bridge an open crack. Sealing over one changes its color and nothing else, and the crack reappears through the new surface within weeks.
Is there a crack too big to fill?
Yes. Past about an inch and a half, or once cracking has broken into a network of squares, filling won't hold because the surface around it is moving independently. Those areas get cut out and patched instead.
When is the best time of year for crack filling?
Spring or early fall in Baldwin and the surrounding area is ideal, because cracks are at a middling width. In high summer they're at their tightest and in deep winter they're at their widest, and filling at either extreme means the filler is working against the movement rather than with it.

The Lots and Surfaces in Baldwin

Baldwin is a village of about 4,400 in St. Croix County, sitting at I-94 Exit 19 where US 63 crosses the interstate. It's about 49 miles west of Eau Claire and about 48 miles east of Minneapolis, and the county it's in is counted as part of the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro. US 12 and US 63 run through the village on top of the interstate. The county seat is Hudson, further west on I-94.

The industrial ground here has names on it. The I-94 Industrial Park and Baldwin East, a commercial and light industrial park, are the two the village markets, and TID No. 7 is a 258-acre mixed-use district at the south end created in 2007 to bring industrial and commercial development in. The plants are where the big private lots are: Vital Plastics runs injection molding out of about 70,000 square feet across two buildings on VandeBerg Street, Skycoat does powder coating, e-coating and wet painting on Evergreen Street, and Donaldson has a Baldwin plant.

The rest of the commercial surface is the interchange and the hospital. Exit 19 carries a truck stop and three more fuel and convenience stops, plus a pair of hotels off Baldwin Plaza Drive. Western Wisconsin Health is a 25-bed hospital on Bergslien Street just off the interstate, and it runs clinics in Roberts and Spring Valley too. In the village itself the stores are along Cedar Street, and the school district keeps Greenfield Elementary and Baldwin-Woodville Area High School here, with the middle school over in Woodville.

Where we work in Baldwin

  • I-94 Industrial Park
  • Baldwin East
  • TID No. 7 at the south end of the village
  • The Exit 19 interchange

Around Baldwin: I-94 Exit 19 at US 63, Western Wisconsin Health on Bergslien Street, The 1905 Red Church outside the village, Nilssen's Foods on Cedar Street, Baldwin-Woodville Area High School on 13th Avenue.

4,352 people, 2024 Census estimate.

St. Croix County is glacial ground: moraine running from clay through to boulders across most of the eastern county, and an outwash plain of stratified gravel, sand, silt and clay in the southwestern corner. Which one is under a lot changes what the frost does to it.

Get a Free Estimate in Baldwin

Tell us what it looks like and we'll come measure it. You get a written price before anything starts.

(715) 450-9897
  • Free on commercial lots and properties in Baldwin
  • A photo of the problem helps, and it can go in the message
  • Surfaces that are not ready yet get told so at the estimate

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