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Crack Filling and Sealing in Colfax

Crack Filling and Sealing in Colfax, Wisconsin.

Hot rubber crack filling for driveways and lots in Colfax, before the freeze does the expensive part.

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4.7 from 18 Google reviews

About 25 minutes northwest of Eau Claire. Free estimates, and a straight read on whether it needs doing yet.

A web of freshly filled cracks running across a parking lot, the rubber still glossy.
1,252 People in Colfax
4.7 Google ratingFrom 18 reviews
2-3 yrs Reseal cycleIn Colfax
400°F Crack fillerDirect-fire rubber

What a Crack Filling and Sealing Job Looks Like in Colfax

For a village of this size the commercial surface is unusually spread out, which matters when you're pricing a job rather than looking at a map.

Main Street is the retail corridor and it runs in two clusters, the 100 block and then the 400 through 600 blocks, with small frontages and shared access. East Railroad Avenue is the second one, and it's the heavier of the two: the co-op with its fuel and agronomy traffic, the village public works yard, the museum. University Avenue is the whole school campus on a single site, elementary and high school together, which is one large parking area with a summer-only window.

Then there's manufacturing, on Bremer Avenue and Willow Street, which is genuine industrial loading in a village most people drive through without noticing it has any.

Crack Filling and Sealing specifically in Colfax

Grade change near the river means water moves rather than sitting, and a crack on a sloped drive here takes fines out of the base as it drains. Filling those early is worth more than the surface appearance suggests.

The Driveways and Lots in Colfax

Colfax sits on the Red Cedar River in Dunn County where Eighteen Mile Creek joins it, about eight miles north of the I-94 corridor. Highways 40 and 170 are the routes through the village. The river banks here are steep and wooded with sandstone outcrops, which isn't incidental: the village had a sandstone quarrying industry and its two landmark buildings are both built from the local stone.

Colfax is really two housing stocks, and the reason is specific. On June 4, 1958 an F5 tornado crossed the south and east of the village and leveled dozens of homes. Those parts were rebuilt afterwards, and the Census figures still show it: almost 30 percent of the housing here dates from the 1950s, a far larger share than any other town in the area, with driveways laid to match.

The parts the tornado missed still carry the older stock, including the 1915 municipal building on Main Street and the 1914 depot that's now the railroad museum. What that means in practice is that two drives a few streets apart in Colfax can be forty years different in age, and they want different answers.

Colfax

We work the whole village rather than a named handful of neighborhoods.

Around Colfax: Colfax Municipal Building, Colfax Railroad Museum, Red Cedar River, Colfax Red Cedar Preserve, Felland Park.

Standard 48-inch frost depth. The Red Cedar corridor through the village has steep banks and real grade change, so drainage varies sharply between the river side and the flat ground west of Main Street.

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 Colfax

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.

With a sealcoat job

Driveway

Measured on site

  • Most driveways need some, and it's included up to a point
  • Heavy cracking is quoted separately and said up front

Crack filling alone

Driveway, no sealcoat

Measured on site

  • Worth doing on its own if the surface is otherwise sound

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 Colfax

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 sealcoating and striping through October · Call (715) 450-9897

Questions We Get in Colfax

What Colfax calls us about, answered straight.

More questions answered
Our house is in the part of town that was rebuilt after the tornado. Does that matter?
It tells us roughly what the driveway is: late 1950s or 1960s, often laid thin over whatever base was there at the time. Some of those have held up well and seal beautifully. Others have a base that was never really built, and no amount of sealer fixes that. The age narrows it down; walking on it settles it.
Is Colfax too far out for a driveway job?
No. It's about twenty-five minutes and we work Dunn County regularly. As everywhere, several drives on one street in one visit costs each of you less than one drive on its own.
Our drive is on the river side and the neighbor's is up on the flat. Same job?
Usually not. The Red Cedar corridor through the village has steep banks and real grade change, and the ground west of Main Street is flat by comparison. On a slope the water moves, which means a crack acts as an inlet and takes fine material out of the base as it drains. On the flat the water sits, which is a different problem with a different answer. Two drives a few streets apart here genuinely want different work.
Fewer than half the homes here are single-family. Does that change anything?
It means a real share of what looks like residential work is actually shared surface: duplexes, small apartment buildings and the parking that goes with them. Those carry more vehicles than a single drive does, wear at the entrance and the aisle rather than in the middle, and get quoted like a small lot with the bid saying which areas are included. That last part matters when more than one person has to approve the number.
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 Colfax 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.

Get a Free Estimate in Colfax

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 driveways and lots anywhere in the service area
  • 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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