Almost anyone must have heard that bumping sound coming out of those warehouses in the industrial setup. As the moving vehicles cross the joint of the surface it makes a cracking sound which is pretty weird and dangerous in many ways. It does seem like the slabs are damaged, the joints are cracking and gives a very uncomfortable experience.
These issues have led to a good amount of research to develop a surface that is much more smooth and convenient to travel. This has led to an emergence of seamless or almost near-seamless floors. It has turned out to be an important development in many places named in the distribution or large movement facilities. These Seamless Floors are providing better options in terms of much less repair cost and a very smooth surface. The problems of stacked goods falling over have almost vanished and it helps in saving a lot of time and cost. The joints create the most problems in earlier settings because they deteriorated really fast and hence those various noise issues. The joints in seamless floors happen to be in perfect shape for years and there is no vibration or any sort of impact when the vehicles move over it. There are studies on how the introduction of seamless floors has reduced the chances of falls and injuries. They are very effective in preventing forklifts from falling over, and given the data from safety and health administration about forklift incidents killing at least 85 each year, seamless floors seem a great option. Although, a very careful and experienced construction is required to enjoy the advantages the seamless floors have to offer.
The advantage of seamless
Do you know what’s the major concrete being used in real estate? It is the soil-supported concrete that is used in almost a third of overall concrete being used in real estate. This is also being used largely in commercial properties. The slabs come with performed joints that are spaced almost 22 to 26 times the thickness of the slab. The joints themselves though behave as a crack. When the concrete starts drying, those joints temporarily address the shrinkage, but as the stress over it exceeds, the concrete eventually cracks. Though these cracks sometimes act as the binding force and reduce the stress caused by moving heavy vehicles.
The crack and joints create issues for the safety of the building users. Big maintenance I required on those joints many times. Now the case is very much different in seamless and near-seamless floors. The joint spacing in seamless floors is more than 100 times the slab thickness. The number of joints is far less than the typical concrete setting and this means much fewer repairs are required. This point plays a huge role in choosing by using seamless floors. These benefits have given a huge rise to seamless flooring in Florida.
Two ways to go
The first approach is a much more traditional one where a proper building plan is submitted in advance with clearly defined technical details and the bids made by the contractor in a proper format. This has some serious advantages for the owner who can study everything in detail before anything starts and keep a degree of control and pressure for what all happens on the ground. If the designer has got some familiarity with the system, the approach works the best but then it also poses risk for the designer because he is solely responsible for all the performing outcomes.
The second approach works a different way. One has to mark the slab areas within the site plan, mention all the loading conditions and the specialized design required for the installation of the slab. This approach gives a better idea about the crack frequency and all the width to determine how well the concrete will work. The owner will not require a specialist engineer while following this approach. The cost involved will be slightly higher but the expectations are clearly defined in advance.
Construction techniques
Many methods can be used to maintain the stress in the slab below the failure point. Improvement in the distribution of the stress, reduction in curling stress, reduction in shrinkage will all be helpful. Whatever steps are taken for improvement few things remain very basic, like one has to make sure about the proper soil support. Few other things could be followed to avoid shrinkage. If the low water content in the mixture is assured, it can help reduce shrinkage. Also, if the cement is rightly designed, which expands upon the setting it will end up helping in avoiding the shrinkage.
Specialized products
The shrinkage compensation concrete when combined with the steel fibers can do wonders in execution. Also, even though what technology is being used or what method is at work, it remains a possibility to build large span slabs, which ends up providing equal strengths of a conventional slab and there would rather be no issue from the use of joints.
Towards the end it is important to make sure that the designer and the contractor both are made aware of the performance requirement, they must have the idea to measure and achieve them keeping the time frame in mind.
Contact the leading floor contractors in Florida for the best industrial floor installation services. Sealwell Inc. is one of the best floor installation companies working in different cities of Florida. Call us at 844-443-2844 or mail us at kevin@sealwellinc.com
Comments