Editor’s note: This is an installment of the bimonthly feature DIY Adventures, in which reporter Penny Nakamura tackles a home project and reports about the process.

I want to make a full confession from the start: This particular do-it-yourself project was so challenging, I only finished one-third of it. I was attempting to blacktop my 2,300-square-foot driveway that also included an uphill area.

As you may know by now, these DIY articles are quite an adventure, and the expert consultants become my best friends for a week, as I dial up their cellphone numbers and frantically ask their advice. This usually happens after a mistake. Central Oregon Asphalt Sealing owner Zach Russell was no different, even taking my panicked calls while he was on vacation with his wife.

I should’ve known this was a big job to tackle, as Russell initially warned me that most DIY homeowners who attempt to blacktop usually only have 500 to 600 square feet of driveway — mine was almost four times that size.

The truth is, I never saw the value of sealing my driveway, which is why for the past seven years it was never done. All the while, the asphalt was chipping away season after season.

“You’ll know you need to blacktop when the surface is coming apart, like this,” explained Russell, as he gently kicked up some asphalt pebbles that were lose. “With our extreme weather here, we get sun oxidation, and then with the snow and rain, the water freezes and expands. All this causes the asphalt surface to break apart. When you blacktop, you’re really protecting your investment, because it’s much less costly to seal your driveway than to have it asphalted again.”

Russell and his team at Central Oregon Asphalt Sealing have sealed hundreds of thousands of miles of roadway and parking lots in our area, including Redmond Airport’s runway and taxiway. I figured if they could do a runway, surely I could tackle this driveway, especially with Russell’s advice.

Getting started

The first thing you’ll need to do is use a leaf blower and blow off your driveway. I borrowed a friend’s leaf blower and started blowing away the leaves and pine needles. This actually takes longer than you anticipate, because the blower doesn’t actually blow it where you want it to go. In truth, it’s rather frustrating. So after 90 minutes of leaf blowing, and feeling I wasn’t making much progress, I brought out my trusty Kenmore vacuum cleaner. I figured if you can’t blow the debris away, maybe you could suck it into a bag.

I’m afraid to say the crazy neighbor lady — that would be me — was at it again. Yes, I did vacuum my driveway, with the help of a 100-foot extension cord. After two changes of the vacuum cleaner bag, and a new HEPA filter, my driveway was clean and ready for my next step. (Honestly, without the head on the vacuum cleaner, you can really get into the asphalt cracks, to get it ready for crack sealing.)

Note to self: It might look less strange if one uses a Shop-Vac. Must buy one. I did see one neighbor slow down in her car and give me a strange look as I vacuumed. I gave a friendly wave, and she sped away. I felt like the children’s book character “Amelia Bedelia.”

The second day of this DIY project was a bit ominous. I woke up and realized I had forgotten to turn off the automatic sprinklers, so the sides of my driveway were wet.

I’d have to wait a few hours to start. Then, on closer inspection, I noticed our dog decided to perform her morning constitution on the driveway, which was not attended to by some child in this household. To make matters worse, a certain teenage driver in this house ran over this pile with a car, in a rush to get to school. More fun for mom, so with the jet spray nozzle on the hose, I cleaned up said mess and waited for the water to dry.

As it turned out, waiting was needed, because the weather needs to be at least 50 degrees to blacktop, and this particular morning had a decidedly winter chill.

In the meantime, I drove out to Phoenix Asphalt, which sells its sealer mainly to commercial companies but will sell to a person doing a DIY project. It’s definitely worth the drive to north Bend.

“You don’t want to use the sealer they sell at the national hardware chain stores,” cautioned Russell. “That stuff they sell may be OK for places like California and Arizona, but it won’t hold up for Central Oregon weather.”

As it turns out, Phoenix Asphalt has about 80 percent of the market share for its blacktop sealer in this region. The special formula, which is made in its Portland production plant, is made to withstand the vagaries of Oregon weather.

“We make our product from 60 percent of asphalt materials, which is four to seven times more than the brands you’ll find at the big box stores,” said Phoenix Asphalt president Jim Hendricks. “Those big box stores sell a product that usually has 10 to 20 percent of asphalt material, and the rest is water, so it’s fairly thin, and it won’t last a year. Our product should last a homeowner about five years.”

I was sold, because I wanted to buy local, and perhaps more importantly to many consumers, Phoenix Asphalt sells its 5 gallon seal coating for considerably less than other locations, at $30 per 5 gallon bucket. A quick glance at a couple of the national hardware chain stores found blacktop sealing products selling anywhere from $40 to $45 per 5 gallon tub.

To calculate how much you’ll need, Russell says the rule of thumb is one gallon of blacktop material per 25 square feet of driveway. After calculating my 2,300-square-foot area, he estimated I’d need 92 gallons.

“It may vary, because if you haven’t ever blacktopped, or you don’t do it regularly, the surface will be very thirsty, and it will absorb more of the material,” said Russell.

Sealing the cracks

Because we had never blacktopped our driveway, I was informed by Russell that I had 45 feet of lineal cracking. Even before you can start blacktopping, one must seal the cracks.

There are two ways to approach sealing cracks. The first one sounded easy enough, until I heard Russell say the words, “weed torch.”

“It’s really easy; all you have to do is get this product (called) Crack Stix, which is like a long black rope, you lay it in the crack, and then you melt it into the cracks with a weed torch,” said Russell. “That’s how the road crews do it, too.”

For those of you who don’t know what a weed torch is, it’s like a blow torch with a long handle that’s used to not only melt Crack Stix but to also burn out weeds.

Having suffered through weeks of smoke from the Pole Creek Fire near Sisters, mental red alerts were firing off in my head, as I imagined myself with a weed torch. I remember my battle with the water pressure hose — I still have the scars in my deck to prove it. While the weed torch might have been easier, I didn’t want to take any chances, given the fact that my fall cleanup hasn’t started, and there are plenty of pine trees and pine needles in our immediate vicinity.

The second method of sealing cracks is called cold crack sealing. This sounded much safer to me, but Russell did caution that this method of sealing does not bond as strongly and probably wouldn’t last as long. But I couldn’t be swayed because I have a real fear of fire.

Cold crack sealing was fairly easy. I bought a $12 gallon bottle of the Phoenix Asphalt Crack sealant, which comes out as a very thick paste. The mixture is so thick, I had to stand on the bottle to squeeze it out into the cracks. Once you get a thick rope of it into the cracks, you’ll need a trowel or spatula to smooth it into the cracks. My smoothing technique wasn’t that great, it looks as if I have small lava tubes in some areas, but at least they’re not as big as speed bumps.

I guess this is where I should come clean, so to speak. I had to get this DIY job done pronto, as my husband was out of the country on business, and he was less than confident in my abilities to do this project. I think his words a week earlier were something like this, “I absolutely, in no uncertain terms, don’t think you should be doing this job.”

Of course to me, that was just one opinion. I needed to get this done before he returned. It would be a surprise.

Fear strikes the heart

I had serious trepidation dumping out my first gallon of blacktop sealant onto the driveway. I had my trusty squeegee in hand — yes you spread this stuff with a giant squeegee with a long handle. This blacktop sealer is a thick slurry, and yes it stains everything. Wear clothes and shoes you plan to get rid of after you’re done. It will be very hard to erase any mistakes, which is why I duct-taped the pavers that border the driveway, as I preferred not to have them turn black.

Then, of course, there was the fear of having my driveway look like the lunar surface, or an uneven lava flow. To make sure that wouldn’t happen, I decided I would be better off pouring the black sealant out a little bit at a time, so I got an old Trader Joe’s half gallon milk carton from the recycle bin, and used that as my pouring container. I would dunk the milk carton into the 5 gallon bucket and then pour it into the area I was working on. Oddly, I didn’t think I’d need gloves to do this work, so my hands turned blacker and blacker with each gob of black sealant I poured out with my milk container.

As you might imagine, my clumsy attempts at being careful as I spread each milk container full of this black slurry onto the driveway took a laboriously long time. To make matters worse, it wasn’t spreading that well. As Russell had cautioned, this driveway was very thirsty, the sealant was absorbing very quickly and settling. After using 10 gallons, I realized there was no way I was getting 25 feet per gallon.

After about 30 gallons, and three and half hours later, I had completed about 600 feet, and I was tired. My hands were completely black, and underneath all the black staining were big blisters on my right hand. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, my husband came home a day early from his business trip, and caught me in the act. Fortunately, he saw the small patch I had completed, and he actually admitted it looked better than the original asphalt, so he was encouraged. I was not.

I was in all honesty, discouraged, but didn’t admit it. I realized as I oozed the black sealant around with the squeegee, that at the pace I was going, I’d be at this past midnight.

As I was berating myself, and hitting my low point, the Central Oregon Asphalt Sealing team dropped by the house to check on my progress. To see three professionals jump out of their truck was like seeing the cavalry come in after a long fight. I raised the white flag, and at this point would’ve paid them almost any amount to finish the job. There are several reasons to do a DIY, and for most, saving money is a big part of it.

Russell originally told me that if he were bidding on my driveway, he estimated to do the entire 2,300-square-foot driveway, including the hot crack sealing, it would cost $450.

The small 600-square-foot portion I completed, which is the average size of a subdivision driveway had already cost me just under $200. For me to finish the job would’ve exceeded the professional bid price. Another reason people do DIYs is because they enjoy it; I was most definitely not enjoying this.

“Yes, if you have a smaller driveway, like 500 or 600 square feet, it might make sense to do it yourself because as a contractor I do have a minimum bid price I have to charge, because of my crew and equipment,” explained Russell. “But for a large driveway, that will need a lot of sealer, it starts to be less cost effective to do it yourself. We buy the sealer at a bulk price.”

Prolific professionals

So after crying “uncle,” I watched the professional team of three from Central Oregon Asphalt Sealing work their black magic.

Honestly, I wanted to cry, out of relief and joy because they were so efficient and fast. The best analogy I can give you is comparing myself to the replacement NFL referees who officiated the football games during the official lockout. Then when the real NFL referees returned — guys who know the game — a sense of relief fills the air.

The pros finished the rest of the driveway in less than an hour. I didn’t really need to duct tape the paver borders of this driveway because they’re that precise. They didn’t miss a beat. As for myself, I’m still in awe days later, as I try to get the black sealer off my hands and nails. Thank you to Russell and the team at Central Oregon Asphalt Sealing for saving the day, and thank you for not laughing at my feeble attempt at this job.

Follow-up

Well there’s a big difference in the 600-square-foot area I attempted, and the area done by the professionals. I noticed as my section dried, it started to look like a drought-stricken region, as the black sealer was cracking up in one patch. The entire area that the professionals completed is perfect.

It would appear I skipped a step. A big step. If you have an oil stain in your driveway, you need to use an oil primer to try to get it off before you blacktop. Tomorrow, I will buy another bucket of sealer, and attempt a do-over on this section. Live and learn.