Watched this on the news it’s an old concept that’s been studied for 30+ years. glad they’ve finally decided to make use of it (my suspension components will appreciate it), an interesting design for sure. Not sure what to call it “tracked roller” “rubber belted compactor”.

www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/pothole-professor-pavement-asphalt-ottawa-carleton-1.4563986

I know Tomlinson has tight ties with our local cat dealer, one can only imagine the monopoly cat would have if they bought the patent.


Not to mention it would make a really cool model

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- Tyler

Very interesting way to look at compaction. I wonder if the cracks he is seeing are due to the traditional compaction roller on a mat that is too cold. We work under tough compaction specs and it is easy to get caught over beating the mat. Oscillatory rollers can help sometimes get compaction on cooler mats.

Couple of quick problems I see. There is no vibratory compaction. So asphalt mixes would have to be redesigned to allow all static compaction to prevent rutting. Also everytime a track roller like that would stop it would leave a very small bump in the mat. (To help prevent this in conventional rollers each time the roller changes direction it is done on a diagonal in the center of the mat to allow for the next pass to take out the bump.)

I like the theory. I would like to see a track machine that would cover the whole width of the mat and provide all the compaction in one pass. Then again that machine would be really really heavy.

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-Ethan
Collection 8/2/2016
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