Seamless
industrial floors are increasingly replacing jointless floors. Whereas jointless
floors still have contraction joints every 40 meters or less, seamless floors
have no joints whatsoever, no matter how large the surface of the floor is. The
optimized crack control and high impact resistance of the series in combination
with only a top mesh provides a system with intensive usage, and reduced
maintenance and repair costs.
Fluid
tight floors, water tight structures and coated slabs
It
has been specifically designed to affect cracks between 0.1 and 0.3mm, enabling
you to create durable fluid and/or water tight structures with the most
stringent serviceability requirements. Combined reinforcement can also be used
as the substrate for hard thin toppings such as epoxy layers and other
coatings. Along with only one top mesh a crack width limitation designed for
the specific SLS requirement can be applied. A
coating was applied in order to assure tightness. The slab is subject to a very
stringent crack width limitation in order to allow the coating to remain
undamaged. A combined solution with only a top mesh + high performing SFRC is a
most practical, economical and time saving way of construction.
Structural
floors and seismic floors
Industrial
floors are usually ground-supported and not interfering with the integrity of
the actual building. However, there are structural floors on which the entire
building is erected. Those floors additionally act as foundation slab that is
bracing and carrying the entire building load. The
raft foundation of a 30m high production facility. The whole building is
erected on the slab with cantilever columns exerting loads of more than 5 MN
and 2 MNm into the slab. An additional requirement was for a seamless construction
with crack width limitation to 0.2 mm. Design and execution was in combined
reinforcement saving around 60% of the traditional reinforcement that would
otherwise have been required. The tremendous effect of this solution was the
time saving outcome and the practicability.
In
seismic areas, floors function as a tie beam for structural elements, such as
columns and pad foundations. Significant uplift forces, and in plane forces
during a seismic event, have to be dealt with. A combined solution offers a
practical, economical and time saving solution.
Floor
on piles
SFRC
floors on piles have already been carried out from time to time though with
stricter limitations in terms of pile distances, slab thickness and additional
amount of reinforcement. All as to date executed SFRC piled floors were usually
solutions with additional reinforcement along the pile grid or with a piece of
mesh above the piles. Because of its exceptional load bearing capacities, it
enable the construction of floors on piles without traditional reinforcement.
This does not only save time during construction, but also creates new
possibilities for floors on piles.
Clad
Rack foundations
Clad
Rack warehouses are any type of storage system in which the shelving facility
is part of the building structure, thereby avoiding the need for the civil
works of a conventional building. For this type of warehouse, the shelving
facility not only supports the load of the stored goods, but also the load of
the building envelope, as well as external actions, such as wind, snow and
seismic actions. Most clad rack buildings are automatic systems (AS/RS) using
robotic equipment for handling loads.
Accordingly
the foundation of this racking system is a real raft foundation that
additionally has to fulfill the requirements of a floor. The raft is executed
before the rack system is erected, meaning temperature needs to be considered
for a monolithic slab type. A typical solution with SFRC can be in combination
with or even without the use of mesh or any other traditional reinforcement
methods. Because of its unique capabilities, it provides utmost strength and
durability to preserve the integrity of the clad rack structure from downward
forks, uplift from wind loads and seismic forces. The elimination of
traditional reinforcement can achieve significant savings
Raft
foundations
Steel
fiber reinforced concrete has been used for years in foundation slabs of
residential buildings. The legal possibility to design this kind of load
bearing structure was supported by local general approvals. However foundation
slabs have been limited to certain loads and size measurements. Due to recent
codes (e.g. German Guideline) there is no limitation, neither of applicable
loads nor to the size measurement. As such raft foundations of multi storey
buildings of any kind can be executed with SFRC, or combined reinforcement
respectively. Since these are in most cases heavy loaded rafts, big in size and
subject to a stringent crack width limitation combined reinforcement is mostly
applied. As a rule of thumb about 50% of the traditional reinforcement gets
replaced. This is clearly depending on the SFRC performance are particularly
favorable and will generate bigger savings. The raft foundation of the building was carried
out in combined reinforcement. One main reason for the decision towards SFRC
was to minimize shear studs and shear reinforcement. With the solution using
combined reinforcement both has been achieved. Bending reinforcement and
reinforcement for crack width requirement has mainly been reduced. On top most
foreseen shear studs and shear reinforcement have been completely skipped by
the combined solution. As such cost saving, time saving and constructability
have been the main reason for this solution. The key applications of the
extended application area for SFRC. Different elements other than those mentioned
herein are certainly also possible.
