Other than a recent cold spell the weather has been fantastic so it may seem odd to raise the subject of snow/ice equipment but believe it or not, it does make sense. Our suppliers offer special pre-season pricing which, when coupled with our 8 branch buying power, provides DEL with equipment costs as low as anyone in North America for Swenson salting/sanding equipment. We are prepared to pass those savings along to you and will not be undersold by anyone in Ontario so please have a look at our early bird specials. While on this subject we want to raise the issue of anti-icing and pre-wetting because its use can result in significant cost savings for the contractor. Surprisingly, other than on larger highway equipment we rarely see it in use even though it is available on smaller pick-up truck and V-box spreaders for parking lots, laneways and residential/commercial environments. A crash course on the basics .......

Liquid Anti-icing - Anti-icing measures are preventative and aim to prevent the bond of frozen precipitation to the road surface. It can dramatically cut the cost of maintaining a safe road surface over conventional reactive deicing techniques and are applied in liquid form (salt brine which is mixture of rock salt and water) to roads just before a snow or ice storm. Although available in many forms (sodium chloride, calcium chloride, magnesium chloride, potassium acetate, and calcium magnesium acetate) brine is the most common and proven material in use today.

Prewetting - Prewetting is the process of coating the dry material with anti-icing solution prior to the salt actually hitting the road surface so that deicing the roads is done more effectively. There are three ways to prewett: solution is injected into the dry material stock pile; solution is sprayed into a loaded spreader or on the material as it is being loaded into the spreader, or spreader mounted spray system can dispense solution onto the dry material as it is discharged towards the road surface. Prewetting the dry material as it is discharged from the spreader is the most effective technique and helps it work more effectively as a deicing agent for two reasons:

• Wet salt clings to the road instead of bouncing off or being swept off by traffic resulting in less salt being spread, saving money and minimizing the threat to the environment.
• To be effective as a deicing agent, salt requires moisture which dissolves it releasing heat and thereby melting the ice and snow as well as breaking the ice-road bond. When temperatures drop below freezing there is no moisture on the road making dry salt ineffective. Prewetting the salt, however, ensures that there will be enough moisture to facilitate the melting process. Then, prewetted salt works faster and at lower temperature than does dry salt, with less waste.