Services We Offer

Adams teams use satellite technology to pave airport runways with accuracy down to the thickness of a coin!

More information about this advanced technology, including GPS-driven paving, coming soon!

At Adams Construction, we strive to minimize the environmental impact of our operations.  Two important initiatives we have implemented are recycling asphalt and utilizing Warm Mix Asphalt technology.

Recycling

Did you know that asphalt is the most recycled material in the U.S.? In fact, it’s 100% recyclable. We ensure that when our crews remove asphalt from roads, and parking lots, it is brought back to one of our operating plants for recycling – instead of being taken to the landfill.

The used asphalt is processed and put back through production, so that our new asphalt includes recycled content in the mix. Adding recycled asphalt decreases overall production time – which speeds up your project and reduces the overall impact on the environment.

We’re ready to accommodate customer-specified levels of recycled content, and we’re frequently involved in projects where LEED points are a priority.

We’ve also been very diligent about employing technology at our plants to minimize impacts to our surroundings, including noise and odors. Perhaps the best illustration is shown in these two photos, where the City of Harrisonburg (Va.) built two schools immediately adjacent to our plant. Our operation functions daily as a good neighbor to hundreds of school children.

Adams has been stewardship-conscious for over 30 years. It’s the way we do business.

Warm Mix Asphalt

Adams has also implemented a relatively new (and environmentally friendly) technology called Warm Mix Asphalt. This technology has been installed on our higher-capacity drum plants and we are embracing this better way of doing business. This technology requires a lower temperature to mix the asphalt, which in turn cuts fuel consumption, reduces emissions and significantly reduces the carbon footprint of our operations.

With 20 plants and more than a half-century of experience across all paving applications, Adams has the expertise—and the capacity—to provide every major type of asphalt mix:

• asphalt curb mix
• cold central plant recycling mix
• dense grade mix
• fine topping mix
• intermediate coarse
• open-graded mix
• porous asphalt mix
• sand mix
• stone matrix asphalt mix

Adams is one of the few suppliers in the region able to meet the stringent specifications of Stone Matrix Asphalt, a coarse, rut-resistant mix with a 20-year life expectancy. Developed in Germany for the Autobahn, this durable blend is ideally suited for interstates and other extremely high-traffic roadways.

We’re also experts in formulating specialty custom blends to achieve the optimal balance of characteristics demanded by your project (durability, traction, porosity/drainage, surface noise, marker visibility, etc.)

Contact us to discuss your particular requirements; whatever your need may be, chances are we’ve tackled it before.

Recycled Asphalt Pavement (RAP)

Some do not realize that old asphalt can be milled and reprocessed—making asphalt 100% recyclable! In many jobs, we incorporate 15-20% recycled product in the application; however, Adams was the first contractor in Virginia to be able to lay down a 30% RAP mix.

Adams has more than a dozen production facilities, each turning out about 300 tons of product per hour. So our quality assurance measures have to be [on an equally large scale].

In our field, quality is all about consistency. To be sure that the quality coming out of our plants is maintained at the highest levels throughout the year, we test thoroughly and regularly.

• We begin by testing the stone coming into our plants, checking every week to make sure we’re starting with the best quarry materials.
• We test plant output in onsite labs to verify our production processes.
• And we cut cores in the field to confirm the ultimate jobsite performance of our asphalt.

Key Characteristics

During our testing, we monitor standard deviation for key variables such as:

• gradation
• air voids
• liquid asphalt content
• density
• voids

Among the advanced quality analysis measures we employ:

• Liquid Asphalt Content – A 1,200° oven burns liquid asphalt off 2,000-gram sample. The remnants of the sample are then weighed to a 10^th of a gram to confirm the sample’s original liquid asphalt content.
• Bulk Specific Gravity – This gyratory process simulates the roller compaction taking place on roadway, and utilizes two samples that are weighed in water and air to confirm density (bulk specific gravity).
• Air Voids – We pull a vacuum on a sample for 15 minutes to get all air out, then compare the specific gravity against sample measurements without the vacuum.

Living up to the highest customer standards

You won’t find many customers more quality-conscious than the Virginia Department of Transportation. And out of the hundreds of thousands of tons of asphalt we’ve delivered to VDOT projects in recent years, only two-tenths of one percent have been “non-compliant” with VDOT specs!

We’ve also routinely met Federal Highway Administration requirements for sites such as the Blue Ridge Parkway.

But possibly the strongest measure of our quality capabilities is the fact that we meet FAA specs for airport runways—where the surface needs to be as close to perfect as it can be.

If we can live up to standards like these, you can be confident we’ll live up to yours.