# mixing salt & Calcium Chloride



## BD Exteriors (Nov 12, 2008)

I am fairly new to the ice management side of snow removal and have some questions about mixing salt and calcium chloride. I have been spreading strait salt for the whole season, and I am looking for something with a little bit more bite, I'm wondering if adding a 50lb bag of calcium chloride per yard would help? or how many bags per yard would help?

And also would that keep my bulk salt from getting hard on the pile or in the v/box?

Or any other recommendations would be helpful

thanks


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## NW Snow Removal (Oct 12, 2007)

salt freezes when below 15 degrees if it has moisture in it so as far as keeping it from freezing in the vbox make sure you don't store it outside loaded. Try and store bulk material inside so it stays dry, as the more moisture you add the more likely it will freeze. it is is frozen adding a lil dry calcium will help, but not very well, and certainly not as much as liquid.


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## deicepro (Mar 24, 2009)

Heres my $.02
Mix up some calcium chloride liquid and spray your salt pile, its easy to do.
I can spread salt for 2 weeks straight after a storm, so I leave my truck fully loaded, all the time, covered of course, never had salt freeze in the hopper unless it gets wet with the cover off, Then I just spray it down with CC and good to go again. The liquid will give your salt more bite.


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## Westhardt Corp. (Dec 13, 2009)

"How cold are the temperatures that I'm dealing with?" should be the first question answered. Cal will help when the temps drop, but if they're mild it's not to going to show a major improvement over straight rock.

Treating with liquid cal is seldom a bad idea, but I'd save it for when temps drop.


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## BD Exteriors (Nov 12, 2008)

thanks for the help. Is there a formula for how much liquid calcium chloride that you would spray on per yard of salt?


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## deicepro (Mar 24, 2009)

BD Exteriors;968179 said:


> thanks for the help. Is there a formula for how much liquid calcium chloride that you would spray on per yard of salt?


8 to 10 gallons per ton


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## forestfireguy (Oct 7, 2006)

At a previous employer we treated our salt with magic for a couple seasons, after that we went to straight MagCl, worked really well, never had a frozen spreader, though we also never left salt loaded overnight, we did commonly load hours and hours before salting. 

We make or own brine for a couple sites, it is salt brine sweetened up with 250lbs of Peladow per 1000 Gal, would treating our pile with this mix aid in freeze-up or the chunking we get, our salt has been sitting for about 2 weeks since our last event, we double tarp currently, after our coverall frame was too small for our new bin we're exploring options, trying to decide whether to "stick build" something or buy a 30x ?? coverall. Anyway, without good protection we find a min 
6" thick "crust" over the pile.


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## Kubota 8540 (Sep 25, 2009)

Last year I sprayed my bulk salt pile with 8 gal/ton. I would use less, maybe 4-6 gallons/ton if I were to spray it this year. JMO


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## 1daniel1 (Dec 17, 2009)

*calcium pellets*

If you are not able to or don't want to pay for the liquid calcium, you can like you said mix pelletized calcium with the rock salt for better performance at sub 15 Farenheit temps but you would have to add a bit more than a 50lb. pag per yard. When temps go really low, we mix at a 6/1 ratio of rock salt to calcium and the performance is great.


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## Brad3403 (Sep 8, 2008)

deicepro;967978 said:


> Heres my $.02
> Mix up some calcium chloride liquid and spray your salt pile, its easy to do.
> I can spread salt for 2 weeks straight after a storm, so I leave my truck fully loaded, all the time, covered of course, never had salt freeze in the hopper unless it gets wet with the cover off, Then I just spray it down with CC and good to go again. The liquid will give your salt more bite.


Will windshield washer fluid do the same thing? If you spray the liquid on a load in the V, does the liquid work its way down to the bottom?


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## deicepro (Mar 24, 2009)

Brad3403;971923 said:


> Will windshield washer fluid do the same thing? If you spray the liquid on a load in the V, does the liquid work its way down to the bottom?


I have heard that it does, never tried it.
If its really cold and my sand freezes overnite, I will take a couple 5 gallon pails of cc and dump them in the middle of my spreader, it will leach down


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## snowplowking (Jan 11, 2020)

I know this thread is old but very useful, I always get frozen clumped salt no matter what. After reading this I bought some quick joe whick is flake calcium chloride. I mixed it with hot water to 5 gallon jug poured it into a pump sprayer. I soaked the pile broke up couple of big chunks. The sun hot it and presto my entire supply is usable again. I also had some in my one dump truck and it worked perfectly as well. Temps went down to 4 degrees last night and my salt was perfect thx to all for the help will be treating all my salt going forward with cc


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## Western1 (Dec 4, 2008)

Sweet


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## BossPlow2010 (Sep 29, 2010)

Did you boil it?


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## snowplowking (Jan 11, 2020)

I have a tap in the shop that's about 210 degrees used that almost no mixing required dissolved immediately


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## demetrios007 (Sep 30, 2004)

Can you get treated salt by you in bulk? That's the way to go if you need better results.


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## snowplowking (Jan 11, 2020)

Yes I can but it's much more expensive and short supply towards the end of the season. Next year I may get the triaxle of 22 ton delivered to my property its about 350 bucks more so it might be worth it. It's treated with yellow prussiate of soda they say works great
https://www.jvadeicing.com/products.html


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## Westhardt Corp. (Dec 13, 2009)

snowplowking said:


> Yes I can but it's much more expensive and short supply towards the end of the season. Next year I may get the triaxle of 22 ton delivered to my property its about 350 bucks more so it might be worth it. It's treated with yellow prussiate of soda they say works great
> https://www.jvadeicing.com/products.html


I'm glad this old info was still useful! As far the "yellow prussiate of soda", I'm assuming your talking about their Clearlane product in their site. Now, it's been awhile and could be different, but Clearlane was simply Cargill's treated product, and was treated with liquid Mag (magnesium chloride). Effective and common, but I recall Slicer (made by Central Salt) being a better option if you can get it. Either will keep much better than straight salt if you have to store it long term, just keep it covered and dry.

Happy salting!


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## TwiceStroked (Feb 8, 2010)

Westhardt Corp. said:


> "How cold are the temperatures that I'm dealing with?" should be the first question answered. Cal will help when the temps drop, but if they're mild it's not to going to show a major improvement over straight rock.
> 
> Treating with liquid cal is seldom a bad idea, but I'd save it for when temps drop.


Watch out 4 refreeze, Cal Chlor will suck moisture from air then freeze = black ice.
It has its place in the tool box.


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## Mark Oomkes (Dec 10, 2000)

TwiceStroked said:


> Watch out 4 refreeze, Cal Chlor will suck moisture from air then freeze = black ice.
> It has its place in the tool box.


Only if it dilutes to the point of refreezing. No different than sodium or mag diluting and refreezing.

That can be one of the problems with mag or calcium...they both work extremely fast but can have very little residual. Treating sodium with mag or calcium helps that problem.

But, they are both far more corrosive than sodium and can potentially cause damage to concrete.


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## snowplowking (Jan 11, 2020)

I'm not exactly sure on the ratio I used but it's still going strong through extreme cold Temps however a warmup is approaching and the season is coming to an end next year hopefully I'll have a better setup but it does work well no doubt whatsoever


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## Westhardt Corp. (Dec 13, 2009)

TwiceStroked said:


> Watch out 4 refreeze, Cal Chlor will suck moisture from air then freeze = black ice.
> It has its place in the tool box.


Ummmm, not exactly. Cal won't even consider freezing until -25°, and it's also exothermic (produces heat as it works) so you have to take that into account as well. If it's regularly cold enough out to even be concerned about Cal freezing, you won't be using it (or any other salt) at all. 
You'll grooming the snow and using tire chains. Yes, it's hydroscopic, but it won't actually become wet and freezable merely from absorbing some humidity. Not to mention that most cold climates are incredibly dry in the winter, so that's nominal at best. Test the theory by leaving a bag of Cal open during the winter and see how long it takes before it becomes a block. Just don't do it during the summer, lol.


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