History and FAQ
TriTechnologies has a three-point logo that represents what we do physically and what we believe spiritually. Each point signifies a service that we provide: asphalt repairs, concrete repairs, and asphalt rejuvenation. The three intertwined angled circles symbolize the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Ghost. This is a daily reminder that everybody working together has a common spirit and goal of unity.
The core values of his company are built on honesty, transparency, and excellence.
I started in the pavement preservation industry with my father and brother over 25 years ago. Initially, we used a seal coat to protect the surface of the pavement but quickly realized that the seal coat was not truly protecting the pavement. On the contrary, it was drying it out, chipping, and causing more cracking. We wanted to help preserve our customer’s asphalt investment not repeat processes providing them short-term solutions”. At the time, The Army Corps of Engineers was evaluating products for Air Force runways, aprons, and taxiways that could rejuvenate the asphalt and provide a seal to protect the asphalt from jet fuel. They discovered that only two of the products could penetrate the surface, lower the viscosity and provide a seal on the surface.
“I started in the pavement preservation industry with my father and brother over 25 years ago. Initially, we used a seal coat to protect the surface of the pavement but quickly realized that the seal coat was not truly protecting the pavement. On the contrary, it was drying it out, chipping, and causing more cracking. We wanted to help preserve our customer’s asphalt investment not repeat processes providing them short-term solutions.”
At the time, The Army Corps of Engineers was evaluating products for Air Force runways, aprons, and taxiways that could rejuvenate the asphalt and provide a seal to protect the asphalt from jet fuel. They discovered that only two of the products could penetrate the surface, lower the viscosity, and provide a seal on the surface.
We recognized the need for a superior product and began a search that led us to Dr. Robert “Bob” Boyer of the Asphalt Institute and learned about studies conducted in the 1970s by the Army Corps of Engineers. For more than 40 years, Asphalt Rejuvenator/Sealers have been repeatedly tested and proven. Hundreds of FAA-regulated airports have been rejuvenated. Our products meet the FAA specification P-632 for Rejuvenator/Sealers and have been used in hundreds of airports since the late 90s. Globally, more than 100 billion yards of asphalt pavement have been protected and revitalized by Rejuvenators/Sealers. Our expertise includes airport facilities, county roadways, and commercial parking lots.
Lone Star Specialties (Formerly Reilly industries) has manufactured our Rejuvenator/Sealer WD-2000 since 1994. The Rejuvenator/Sealer was a joint venture between Asphalt Additives and Bitumen Supply to introduce some competition in the market. The Sealer/ Rejuvenator product name began as CI-5 and was later changed to PS/ R 07 after testing was done to lower the VOC content of the material.
In August of 2008, the new Lone Star Specialties, which had been manufacturing the Sealer/Rejuvenator since 1994, bought Bitumen Supply. For marketing purposes, the name was changed to WD-2000, but the quality of the product has remained the same. Lone Star Specialties manufactures many products used in a variety of industries at their ZERO waste facility in East Texas. From 2015-2019, TriTechnologies was the Master Distributor for WD-2000, the Coal-Tar Asphalt Rejuvenator. This allowed for a partnership of growth and exposure for such a proven product success in the industry.
As the environmental initiatives grew so did the need for greener products. In 2016, TriTechnologies initiated a collaboration with Lone Star Specialties to create an exclusive Coal-Tar Free Rejuvenator, AR-16. While there were other Rejuvenators on the market; many were diluted with water, soy beans, or additives that did not provide a black appearance so desired by HOAs, Private Airports, and more. In a class of its own, AR-16 is our Coal-Tar Free Rejuvenator packed with asphalt oils that are distributed throughout the pavement surface with our unique blend of solvents. This Rejuvenator is ideal for use in areas where coal-tar road products are banned. As our commitment to offering more Eco-friendly products grew, we desired a certified green Asphalt Rejuvenator. In 2020, TriTechnologies became a Distributor and Applicator for Delta Mist, a Plant-Based Rejuvenator. With this new relationship with Collaborative Aggregates, we have been able to exceed our green initiative efforts in communities throughout Virginia, DC, Maryland, and the Carolinas, providing a well-proven, tested, and certified green product.
Jeff Pokorny is a veteran leader in the asphalt industry and has been an integral part of building other successful pavement maintenance companies. His passion for treating people fair and respectfully has driven him to begin a worldwide distributor network to deliver the best customer experience. As a visionary, Jeff continually thrives to create a standard of best practices that will develop each Distributor and Applicator within the network.
Reference Publications
Boyer, Dr. Robert E. “Asphalt Rejuvenators ‘Fact, or Fable’”.
Web. Transportation System 2000 Workshop. Feb – March 2000.
Rispen, Amy. “Rejuvenation vs. Re-Paving our Drum Point Subdivision Roads”.
Web. March 2012.
Walker, Donald. “Asphalt Roads PASER Manual”.
University of Wisconsin-Madison Transportation Information Center. 2013 Revision.
“With the proven performance of Asphalt Rejuvenators to revive an aging pavement, the pavement engineer has an economical method to extend pavement life. This type asphalt pavement treatment has the potential to extend the life of an asphalt pavement for several years beyond the point where rehabilitation, or major reconstruction would normally be required; thus significantly decreasing the pavements annual maintenance costs.” —Dr. Bob Boyer, Senior District Engineer, The Asphalt Institute
In the early 50s, there became a concern at US air bases. Asphalt pot holes where appearing in the same locations over and over again. These areas where the result of fuel spillage from the loading of fuel on air craft or the spillage of fuel from pilots checking there fuel tanks for the signs of water. The Army Corp of Engineers and the the United States Air Force requested manufactures to design a product to be applied to the asphalt surfaces at airport parking ramps. This material would need to be fuel resistant for 14 – 21 hours.
One company that brought forth a coal tar based material was Koppers Chemical. This material was designed to be a water based material. 40% of water mixed with sand and a additive to promote an hardening effect. The first in “seal coats” It was easy to apply and meet all the requirements that the Army was looking for. The seal coat was applied to the areas and the fuel damage stopped occurring. In the late 70s, this technology came to the commercial market and has been in use ever since. For the past 40 years, coal tar seal coats have been used to help protect asphalt surfaces from fuel. What we have learned is that these products seem to enhance the effects of cracks that form on the asphalt surface.
As a seal coat is applied to the asphalt surface it is boned mechanically to the surface. As the asphalt surface under goes the natural temperature change from the day time maximum temperature compared to the lower night time temperature difference. The asphalt surface expands and contracts at a different rate compared to the seal coat material. The result is that the seal coat develops cracks in it self. Because the seal coat is bonded to the asphalt surface like paint these cracks propagate into the asphalt surface. (Click Here for the report) A study was undertaken by the The Army Corp of Engineers in the 80s. The goal of the study was to come up with a mix design that would do away with crack formation in the asphalt surface. The study covered 52 mix designs, if you would 52 different ways to make a cake. The ideal was to set forth and see how the asphalt surface would preform with variations of less or more of each additive in the mix design. In the end each sample failed and cracked the asphalt surface.
Final Report “Criteria For Coal Tar Seal Coats On Airport Pavements” Click Here
The deterioration of asphalt pavements caused by hardening and inherent changes in the physical properties of the asphalt binder in the aging process has been generally recognized throughout the transportation industry. The influence of chemical composition of asphalts on pavement performance was initially advanced from research reported by Rostler and White wherein it was determined that an asphalt binder consists of five fractional components which govern its behavior. With aging of the asphalt binder, the fractional components are converted from one fractional component to another fractional component in a hierarchy measured by the asphalt binder consistency; thus, with aging, or oxidation process, there is a corresponding increase in the consistency of the asphalt binder. It was reported that “the ratio of chemically more active to less reactive components present in the asphalt binder was a measure of predictive durability. To affect performance, a rejuvenation material must possess characteristics to restore, or partially restore, the original chemical ratio of the asphalt binder components when applied to the pavement surface. For these phenomena to occur, two general rejuvenation criteria must be satisfied, as follows:
- First, the rejuvenation material has to contain ingredients with chemically active components to decrease the asphalt binder consistency
Second, the rejuvenation material must penetrate the asphalt binder to effect reaction. Based on these research findings, asphalt rejuvenation products have been developed and used as a pavement preservation technique since the mid 1960s.
The U.S. Air Force has a vast worldwide inventory of aging bituminous airfield pavements. Because of the need for pavement preservation and potential for proven rejuvenation products, the U.S. Air Force sponsored the first independent study on the performance of rejuvenation materials. This study was comprised of independent tests to evaluate the rejuvenation characteristics of four different rejuvenation materials and an asphalt emulsion as the control, and was conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over the period from 1971 to 1975. The study involved placing test strip applications of the materials at three different Air Force bases and monitoring the performance for three years.
The results of this study were documented by a report in 1976; commonly referred to within the bituminous rejuvenation industry as the 1976 Air Force report. Adjacent pavement areas were treated at the three Air Force bases with four proprietary products available in 1971 [including Bituminous Pavement Rejuvenator (BPR), Reclamite, Petroset, and Gilsabind; and an asphalt emulsion seal as a control application]. The tests were conducted at Williams AFB, AZ, in the dry, hot southwestern part of the United States, Eglin AFB, FL, in the humid, hot southeastern part of the country, and at Malstrom AFB, MT, in the cold north-central part of the country. The objective of the effort was to evaluate the effectiveness of rejuvenation products on existing aged airfield asphalt pavements and to prepare guide specifications for placing these products. Rejuvenation was judged by a reduction in the viscosity or an increase in the penetration of the asphalt binder in the treated pavement.
The study reached the conclusion that BPR, Reclamite, and Petroset products accomplished rejuvenation of the old asphalt binder while Gilsabind and SS-1 Asphalt Emulsion had a hardening effect. The original Corps of Engineers, Unified Facilities Guide Specification for Bituminous Rejuvenation [UFGS 02787] was developed under this study. Other conclusions were reported, including an indication that the viscosity of treated asphalt was a better indicator of the rejuvenation effect of the materials tested than was the penetration test.
An article written from the Asphalt Institute, “Asphalt Rejuvenators Fact or Fable” Click Here
TriTechnologies was founded in 2010 with the intent to expand the foundation that was already established by working in various capacities in the industry.