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Crack Filling and Sealing in Spooner

Crack Filling and Sealing in Spooner, Wisconsin.

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

Get a Free Estimate Call (715) 450-9897

4.7 from 21 Google reviews

About an hour and a half north of Eau Claire on Highway 53. 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 Spooner

Fifty-one inches of snow a year and average highs below freezing four months running: the freeze cycle up here works every open crack wider until it's filled. Hot rubber at 400 degrees bonds to the crack walls and stays flexible; cold pour lifts out in strips by spring. Spring and early fall, when the cracks are at a middling width, are the months to do it.

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 Spooner

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 Spooner

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 Spooner

What Spooner calls us about, answered straight.

More questions answered
How far north do you go?
Spooner is the top of it: about an hour and a half up Highway 53, for commercial lots. Send the address and what the lot needs and we'll set up a time to walk it. The estimate is free.
When can a lot get sealed this far north?
June, July and August. Sealer needs warm pavement and an overnight low above 50, and Spooner's average lows only clear that in those three months. Crack filling has a wider window because the rubber goes in hot; spring and early fall are its best months.
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 Spooner 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 Spooner

Spooner is the top of the road for us, about an hour and a half north of Eau Claire on Highway 53, a city of about 2,500 that calls itself the Crossroads of the North because 53, 63, 70 and 253 all meet here. It's the largest city in Washburn County, though the county seat is Shell Lake.

The commercial lots here are the hospital, the schools, the downtown and the industrial sites off the highways. Spooner Health is on Chandler Drive. The school district has its elementary, middle and high schools all in the city, and the high school on Highway 70 is a 163,000 square foot building whose track hosts the Heart O' North conference championships. Downtown runs along Walnut Street and River Street, and the state's largest cool-water fish hatchery, on West Maple Street, brings visitors year-round.

The city's development districts hold a machine shop, a warehouse built for Frito-Lay, a 24,000 square foot office and manufacturing building and an auto dealer, and the city has bought another 27 acres between Highway 53 and Highway 63 for what comes next.

Where we work in Spooner

  • Downtown Walnut Street
  • South River Street
  • Highway 70
  • The Highway 53 and 63 junction

Around Spooner: Governor Thompson State Fish Hatchery on West Maple Street, Spooner Health on Chandler Drive, The rodeo grounds on West Beaverbrook Avenue, The Railroad Memories Museum in the old depot, Walnut Street.

2,494 people, 2024 Census estimate.

Spooner's average high stays below freezing from November through February and it gets about 51 inches of snow a year. Overnight lows only average above 50 in June, July and August, which is the sealing window.

Get a Free Estimate in Spooner

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 Spooner
  • 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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Send the form and we'll call you back. The estimate is free.

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