Paving · Residential
Asphalt Repair and Pothole Patching
Most driveways do not fail all at once. They fail in specific places for specific reasons, and caught there the repair costs a fraction of a replacement. The trick is diagnosing why a section failed rather than filling the hole it left.
Free estimate
Ask about asphalt repair and pothole patching
A proper patch is saw cut square back to sound asphalt, because a clean vertical edge gives new material something to bond and compact against. Ragged edges are the reason cold patch works loose. Failed base underneath comes out and is replaced with compacted gravel, hot mix goes in in lifts where depth requires, and the vertical joint is tack coated so the patch bonds to the surrounding pavement.
We also deal with accumulated patchwork, where a drive has been repaired in stages over decades with four different materials in it. Those move at different rates and crack along every seam, and an overlay across them reappears along the old outlines within a couple of years.
Diagnose the cause, not the hole
A failed section almost always has a cause underneath it: water sitting where it should not, a soft spot in the subgrade, an edge with no shoulder support, or a downspout discharging onto the asphalt. Repairing the symptom without the cause buys you one season.
We cut back to sound material, deal with what caused the failure, rebuild the base and patch with hot mix compacted mechanically. Where the cause is drainage, the drainage gets fixed as part of the repair or the repair is not worth doing.
When repair stops making sense
Roughly when failed area passes a quarter to a third of the driveway, or when new failures keep appearing in fresh places rather than the same ones. Scattered spreading failure means the base is generally inadequate rather than locally damaged, and at that point repairs become an annual subscription.
We will tell you when you have crossed that line. A contractor who sells you patches indefinitely on a driveway that needs replacing is making the same money slower and costing you more.
How Massachusetts conditions drive the specification
Massachusetts sets frost depth at 48 inches. A driveway has no footings, so nothing physically reaches four feet, but the frozen zone does, and anything frost can lift it will lift. That makes the base and its drainage the whole structural argument on residential work in this state.
Hot mix here is produced to the MassDOT Standard Specifications, Section 460, using Superpave designs graded by nominal maximum aggregate size. A residential surface course is normally a 12.5 mm mix; a binder course underneath is typically 19.0 mm. Dense graded asphalt needs a compacted lift at least three times the nominal maximum aggregate size, so 12.5 mm wants roughly an inch and a half minimum and 19.0 mm wants nearer three. A coarse mix laid too thin cannot lock its stone together and ravels from the first winter.
Compaction is where the money goes and nobody can see it
Hot mix leaves the plant around 275 to 300 degrees and stops accepting compaction near 185. Everything a roller will ever achieve has to happen inside that window, which shrinks fast on a cool day, on a thin lift, or with wind across the site. Target density on a properly rolled mat sits in the low to mid nineties as a percentage of theoretical maximum.
A few percentage points below that and the mat is permeable. Water then lives inside the asphalt rather than on top of it, and every freeze-thaw cycle works from within. This is why two driveways that look identical on the day of paving can be ten years apart in service life, and why laydown temperature and roller pattern matter more than the brochure the material came with.
Dig Safe, permits and paperwork
M.G.L. c. 82 s. 40 requires Dig Safe notification at least 72 hours before excavation so utilities can mark their lines. It is free and we file it. What it does not cover is private underground work on your own property: septic tanks and leach fields, wells, irrigation, invisible fencing, propane lines and power runs to outbuildings. Tell us where those are, because heavy equipment over a leach field is an expensive mistake Dig Safe will not catch.
Massachusetts also requires a written contract for residential work over $1,000 under M.G.L. c. 142A, and registration under that law gives you access to the state Guaranty Fund. Ask any contractor for their HIC number before paying anything.
What is included
Scope of work
- Diagnosis of the underlying cause
- Saw cutting to square, sound edges
- Removal of failed base material
- Compacted gravel base replacement
- Hot mix in compacted lifts
- Tack coated joints
- Edge and shoulder rebuilding
Related work
Often paired with
Related paving services
Common questions
Before you book
A pothole keeps coming back in the same place. Why?
Because whatever caused it is still there. A pothole is a symptom of the base having failed at that spot, usually because water is getting in and freezing. Filling the hole without fixing the base and the water gives you the same hole next spring.
Why not just use cold patch from the hardware store?
For a temporary fix to get through a winter it is fine and we will not pretend otherwise. It is not a repair. It does not bond or compact properly and it works loose as vehicles turn on it. If you want the hole gone rather than postponed it needs cutting, rebuilding and hot mix.
Where we do this work