(swoosh)
- [Narrator] About 19,000 lane miles are resurfaced
with the seal coat every year
as part of TexDOT's maintenance program.
Over the last 40 years, seal coats have not changed much.
However, new technologies like the mobile LIDAR system
could reduce seal coat maintenance problems,
specifically rock loss, flushing, and bleeding.
- Now, more than ever before, we have an issue in TexDOT
of having a lot of less experienced employees.
And with this lack of experience in our workforce,
they're having problems going out and selecting
and adjusting asphalt rates for our seal coat application.
- The things that affect the seal coat
on existing pavement are the hardness of the pavement,
the absorption properties of the pavement,
and the texture.
The LIDAR, what it does
is measure these different properties that are in the road.
Because it's running a laser,
it can't measure hardness or absorption,
but it can give us some information
that mimics what we see with our eye.
- We have found out that by using this LIDAR,
it can help us make more fine-tuned adjustments.
It gets down on a more finite level.
It's not just the difference
between flushing and not flushing.
It's the degree of flushing.
It's the degree of bleeding,
which may mean the difference
between 100 to 200 in adjustment.
We can take this, and we can make an automated system
that our inspectors can have on their laptop
and they can use that,
and it will give them an answer.
- [Darlene] We're looking at different test methods
to go out and measure these pavement properties.
The LIDAR gave us an interpretation
based on, what we compared to what we saw visually.
Now we're doing hard measurements
and we're gonna look at some different methods
to measure hardness and absorption.
- [Dennis] We're one of the best states in this country,
in the seal coat industry.
We not only wanna be a leader in this country,
we wanna be a leader worldwide.
My goal at TexDOT, and as one of the leaders
of our seal coat program in the state of Texas,
is not to be good, it's to be the best.
And that's what research does for us.
- [Narrator] For more information
and find the publications for this project,
please visit the TexDOT research library
at the link shown below.