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6:00am, Thursday 22 March 2018

Why do we need to remove linemarking on roads, freeways and car parks? Well line painting doesn’t last forever, because over time it fades and needs to be replaced. Lanes on roads and freeways also need to be realigned for a variety of reasons, temporary markings need to be removed and spaces in car parks are often rejigged to optimise parking.

All of this means that you need to call in specialist line marking services to remove the old markings before the new lines can be applied. Old line markings must be removed so that they don’t cause confusion to road users, which means that whatever method of removal is used, the markings must no longer be recognisable.

The old paint material must also be contained in an environmentally acceptable manner and removed and disposed of safely. Having said all of this, there is no single method of removing line painting that works for every situation. At G & T Linemarking, we use one or more of the following four removal methods, depending on the circumstances and the final result required.

Surface grinding: If we need to remove the old line painting on concrete, prior to applying new lines, then we use a dust free concrete grinding method that can be performed on internal and external surfaces. Initially there will still be some slight contrast between the old and new lines, but we follow up with water blasting, which makes the old lines hardly noticeable at all, and whatever slight contrast remains will fade over time.

Scarifying: On bitumen surfaces or uneven concrete surfaces, we use a scarifier to remove old line markings, which can be attached to a dust extractor system, so that the entire process is dust free. The scarifier has tungsten tips that grind the surface of the bitumen, grinding the old linemarking away, but leaving the surface very rough. This isn’t really a problem, because this roughness is quickly smoothed away by traffic.

Blacking out: Predominantly used on bitumen surfaces, blacking out is when we use black line paint to cover the line markings (it’s called greying out when we use grey paint to cover lines on concrete surfaces). This might be the cheapest method to remove old line painting, but it should only be considered temporary, because it fades quickly, causing confusion to drivers as the old lines start to show again.

Water blasting: This is very effective at removing old linemarking from contoured surfaces, as well as from concrete surfaces inside multi-story car parks. It’s a messy method however, requiring a lot of cleaning up afterwards and you need to wait 2 days for the surfaces to dry before repainting the lines.

To remove old line paint effectively, you need a company that specialises in line marking services, so call us today on 07 5549 6733 or send us an email to discuss your needs.