Heating Cold Patch Asphalt Materials

Are you in the asphalt business in need of asphalt material warming, or some other industry where you need potable, easy-to-use product heating? Do you need temperature maintenance for sensitive materials? Whatever the case may be, the Powerblanket Hot Box can help you prep your materials for application or warm your product to the ideal temperature.

Case Study: Hot Box in the Frozen North

Time and again, Powerblanket’s Hot Box has been the saving grace of cold weather construction projects. One of our favorite examples to share is that of Vern Fiehler, owner of Quick Road Repair in Alaska, and it has to do with heating cold patch asphalt, and asphalt material warming.

A Product to Prove 

Roadway repair is especially troublesome in cold climates. Hot asphalt needs to be prepped to temperatures near 300° F. Air temperature and ground temperature needs to be at least above 50° F in order to properly set. Pavement that cools too quickly will harden without achieving the required density needed to support the weight of trucks and airplanes. Keeping asphalt hot while preparing the ground for laying is critical to making this all happen.

Obviously, this is a significant challenge anytime of the year in Alaska. With temperatures staying low at night even in summer, there isn’t a perfect time to pave asphalt and make other road repairs without using additional heating equipment.

Vern had planned on introducing a specialized asphalt repair product, known as Instant Road Repair (IRR), to officials at the Juneau Alaska International Airport. IRR needs to be warmed up to working temperature before it could be applied to roadway issues such as filling potholes and patching cracked street pavement. Unfortunately, his previous method of heating the product was very inefficient, causing Vern to be stuck with cold asphalt. The IRR wasn’t being kept at a sufficient temperature for it to become effective at repairing asphalt roadways and runways.

When Vern met with the field maintenance crew of the airport in order to demonstrate IRR, what happened was nothing short of disastrous.

Embarrassed Much?

For the demonstration, Vern needed to heat IRR. He used a forced-air, ceramic heater to do this. However, the product didn’t perform well at all during the demonstration. Ceramic heaters can be unreliable when you need them to maintain a specific temperature. The air being blown over heating coils within the ceramic heater can’t be controlled as strict as Vern needed it to be. He discovered this fact when he learned that the IRR failed due to overheating. In fact, the product overheated 40° F past its maximum workable temperature. This ultimately cost him a whole pallet of his product and the embarrassment he experienced in front of the airport staff.

Vern’s product wasn’t the problem. And his IRR wasn’t the thing to blame for this untimely setback. Instead, the culprit was merely an unreliable heating solution. The ceramic heater just wasn’t cutting it. Vern needed something that he could have complete say in what temperature his IRR was being held at. No more using fans to blow air over a heat element.

Hot Box to the Rescue

Enter Powerblanket’s Hot Box, which provides even, consistent heat to material no matter how cold the weather. Vern’s IRR was kept at a stable temperature well within its efficiency range, allowing him to finish the airport runway repairs and reconstruct his professional reputation as an asphalt repair business.

Since then, Vern uses the Powerblanket Hot Box for efficient and regulated heating of Instant Road Repair, and continues to keep materials warm when the outdoor air temperature isn’t cooperating.

Stand Up to the Cold with a Hot Box

The Hot Box: a bulk material warmer that is part of the innovative line of Eco-Friendly heating solutions. With the Hot Box, you have a heating solution for remote-location use, job-site heating, transporting temperature-sensitive material, and many other heat-related requirements.

The Powerblanket Hot Box can save you money and time by keeping your products from experiencing the detrimental side effects of cold weather. However, the Hot Box can also bring your product up to working conditions, when you require temperatures above the ambient degrees.

Powerblanket Protects You from Cold 

Like all of Powerblanket’s industrial heating blankets, the Hot Box is extremely user friendly. With no moving parts, it can be easily assembled, disassembled, and reassembled within minutes, making it the ideal answer for cold weather storage, freeze protection, job-site heating, remote location use, and many other situations. For power, all that is needed is for an employee to plug it in to any electrical outlet. It’s so simple.

Hot Box Features:

• Preserve temperature sensitive material
• Install quickly and effortlessly
• Heat bulk materials and palletized products: paint, caulk, resins and epoxies, etc.
• Side access doors
• Certified to UL/CSA/CE standards

Hot Boxes come in three performance levels: Lite, Standard, and Premium. Each unit will maintain temperatures between 100° F and 120° F. With Premium Hot Boxes, you have the option of adding an adjustable thermostatic controller, enabling more precise temperature control.

Don’t be left out in the cold without a hot box. Like Vern, construction and repair professionals all across North America rely on hot boxes to keep going when the weather chills out other heating equipment. Use hot boxes to ensure that all of your temperature sensitive materials stay heated, keeping you and your business operating at full efficiency.