The Second Mat loop
Nothing leaves that does not come back
The millings that come off your overlay ride to the plant at Reedmire, get crushed and screened to mix size, and return blended at up to thirty-five percent of the next truck that backs down somebody’s lane. The loop is not charity — milled asphalt is asphalt and stone we have already paid for, and the plant pays us for it against your job.
Services
The four trades
01
New drives, two lifts — $4.55–5.95 / sq ft
Two and a half inches of hot mix in two compacted lifts over read base, tack coat between them, edges hand-tamped and a crown cut to shed the fen melt. The mix arrives carrying up to thirty-five percent of somebody’s old driveway — sometimes yours.
02
Full-depth reclaim — $2.05 / sq ft
A reclaimer grinds your existing drive and its base together into a new base, in place, which is regraded and re-compacted before the fresh mat goes on. Nothing trucks out, nothing is bought twice, and the drive you paid for in 1998 is under the one you are buying now.
03
Millings lanes — $1.90 / sq ft
Recycled asphalt bladed and rolled in two lifts for barn lanes and long fen drives: not finished pavement, but dry, firm and a third the price of hot mix, and it is the very definition of the loop — old roads becoming new lanes.
04
Seal & stripe — $0.92 / sq ft · $0.80 / lin ft
Cracks routed to a half inch and hot-filled first, then two squeegee coats of sealer; striping follows at four inches with beads if the lot wants it. Every third or fourth season, and we keep the calendar — you should not need a filing cabinet to own asphalt.
How the loop runs
One driveway’s second life, in four moves
The same loop whether the millings came off your overlay or your neighbour’s tear-out — weighed at the plant both times, so the number on the scale slip is the same number that discounts the next job.
Mill
The old surface comes off at an inch and a half and rides to Reedmire as millings — weighed on the plant scale with your job name on the slip.
Crush & screen
The millings are broken to mix size and graded, steel and debris picked out, and stockpiled as reclaimed asphalt pavement.
Blend
The plant folds up to thirty-five percent RAP into the new mix — batch tickets show the percentage, every time.
Relay
The blend comes back hot and is laid in two lifts on somebody’s lane in the fen towns. Sometimes yours again; that is a full loop.
The loop, weighed
Scale slips, not estimates — every figure below is a plant ticket away from anybody who asks to see it.
2025 — 2026
The wall
Six surfaces from the last two seasons. Half of what is in these photographs was in a different photograph five years ago — that is the trade.
Our lane was thirty years of patch on patch and two outfits quoted a full tear-out with forty trucks to the tip. Second Mat ground the whole thing into its own base in a day and laid the new mat on top the next. The reclaim line on the invoice was $2.05 a foot, and nothing left the property but the water truck.
They milled our church court in the morning, and the foreman showed me the batch ticket for the mix that came back two days later — thirty-one percent of it was the court. The new surface is better than the one we replaced, and the old one is in it. Our green committee could not have written a better story.
Before you call
Questions from the loop
The four the fen towns ask first. If yours is not here, the yard line at the bottom runs seven to five and the person on it has milled a lane like yours.
Is recycled asphalt as good as new?
Blended at the plant, yes — and the batch tickets prove the percentage. RAP is asphalt cement and aggregate that already exists; the plant re-heats and re-blends it within spec, and modern mixes containing thirty percent test at or above virgin designs. What fails is millings dumped and rolled cold — which is a lane material, and we sell it as one at $1.90.
What is the difference between reclaim and overlay?
An overlay ($3.70 a foot here) mills the top and lays new surface over a sound base. Reclaim ($2.05 a foot) grinds the entire drive and base together into a brand-new base in place, then lays fresh mat on top — for a drive whose base has failed, it is stronger than an overlay and half the price of a rip-out rebuild.
Do you take clean tear-out or extra millings?
Yes — clean asphalt tear-out and surplus millings come to the Reedmire yard during drop hours, and the scale slip credits against your job when it does. Concrete, dirt-laden chunks and painted seal-coat slabs we cannot take; the plant’s screens decide, not us.
How do you keep the calendar for sealcoating?
Every surface we lay goes in the yard book with its cure date, first-seal date and cycle written beside it, and the book gets checked every spring. We call when the seal year comes — around ninety days for the first coat, then every third or fourth season. A maintained mat runs decades; an ignored one runs ten years.
Drop hours at the Reedmire yard: Tuesdays and Saturdays, eight to noon · (555) 033-5902 · loop@secondmat.example
Put your drive on the loop
Address, rough size, and whether the base is thought to be sound — that is enough to start. The measure is free, the loop discount is real, and the scale slips ride with the invoice. loop@secondmat.example