My shop floor is high strength, high fiber and I think the stuff is great.
Yes there are some tiny cracks in the corners which I pretty much expected
but they are tiny. I should have put in a separate foundation with the
floor isolated from the foundation by 1/2" bead board, but it's a rat wall,
floor all poured as one. Up here where it may reach 10 to 20 below zero at
times that is one whale of a lot of stress in the corners as the shop is
heated. The floor is poured over 1" Styrofoam and reaches the same
temperature as the inside of the shop. It's 70 to 72 degrees within a foot
of the rat wall. That is quite a temperature gradient.
The floor has four coats of two part epoxy. After the second coat I ran
over it with an industrial orbital sander. (those 200# plus units). You
could also do that on bare concrete as well, but I'd want to keep it wet
while sanding or wear a full body suit with breathing air.
They also poured the tower base and anchors at the same time so I have some
good quality concrete.
> Roger asked;
>> What are your recomendations for vibrating "high fiber" concrete.
>
> Hey Roger, I'm not a professional concrete guy, but I play one on TV,
> AND slept at a Holiday Inn Express last night! :-) To answer you
> question, "Add more water!"
>
The guy I mentioned who did the custom basement down in Kentucky said that
they only wanted a minimum amount of water. Just enough to get the stuff to
hydrolize. He said any more water than that actually weakened the stuff.
They sure had a beautiful looking finish when they were done. When I was
there the basement was already finished and they were working on the
foundation for a sun room and some other extensions. Dale told me a year
later there wasn't one single crack in any of the work.
Dale was the guy who dealt with the contractors for building chemical plants
so he had the connections to get that stuff done. <:-)) I mentioned the
area earlier. I think the ground floor plus the second story totaled near
7,000 sq ft and that did not include any of the basement and that house had
a full basement. Hugh garage too.
> I sold concrete tools for a few years and did all the demos. According
> to the concrete guys, they saw no advantage to the fiber and it made
> everything "furry". They still got cracks, etc. The old timers would
> say, "Use more concrete if you want more strength."...or something to
> that affect.
I don't think they say that any more<:-)) The stuff is really good, but
it's also expensive.
OTOH I had the aprons poured for the garage and shop just two years ago. It
was regular concrete with the wire reinforcement. They poured on a hot day,
used too much water, over floated, and it already looks like it's been in
for 20 years in a salt laden atmosphere. It's about $7,000 worth of work
and they claim the damage is from the salt off our cars. If it wasn't for
my wife I'd have the whole works torn out and repoured about 6 inches thick
using high fiber. Those will wear off the apron in just a few months.
>
> To be fair, the "engineers" state that FIBER is the best thing for
> concrete and makes a world of difference! I have yet to be on a pour
> where an engineer was ankle high in the mud or riding on the concrete
> trowel machines with me. YMMV!
>
My experience here and in the chemical industry has been the stuff is great!
73
Roger Halstead (K8RI and ARRL 40 year Life Member)
N833R - World's oldest Debonair CD-2
www.rogerhalstead.com
> Dino - K6RIX
> dino@k6rix.com
>
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