A wide aluminum or steel tool on a long handle, with one serrated edge and one smooth edge, built for working hot asphalt. Rakers use the toothed side to spread and level mix and the flat side to strike off and smooth, especially at joints, edges and around structures. A lute is not a garden rake: it moves mix gently enough to avoid dragging the coarse stone out of it.
Hand me the lute, that joint needs a light touch, not a shovel of mix thrown across it.
Also heard as
- asphalt rake
- lute rake
Related terms
Raker
A paving laborer who works behind the screed with a lute, fixing joints, edges and handwork.
Bump
To push excess mix off the old side of a joint back onto the hot mat with a lute so the rollers can pinch it in.
Joint matching
Setting the screed so the new mat overlaps the old edge slightly and sits just high enough to roll down flush.