Aggregate base is typically composed of crushed rock capable of passing through a 3⁄4 in (19.05 mm) rock screen. The component particles will vary in size from 3/4 inch down to dust. The material can be made of virgin (newly mined) rock, or of recycled asphalt and concrete.
Base is used as a base course in roadways, as a base course for cement pads and foundations, and as backfill material for underground pipelines and other underground utilities.
"Base course" refers to the sub-base layer of an asphalt roadway. Generally consisting of larger grade aggregate, spread and compacted to provide a stable base for further layers of aggregates or asphalt pavement. Aggregate base course is often referred to as ABC.
Famous quotes containing the words aggregate and/or base:
“a fortress against ideas and against the
Shuddering insidious shock of the theory-vendors
The little sardine men crammed in a monster toy
Who tilt their aggregate beast against our crumbling Troy.”
—Louis MacNeice (1907–1963)
“And all the popular statesmen say
That purity built up the State
And after kept it from decay;
Admonish us to cling to that
And let all base ambition be,
For intellect would make us proud....”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)